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■Christ before Pilate"' from a painting by 
M. de Munkacsy 



CHRIST IN 
THE POETRY OF TODAY 

An Anthology from American Poets 

Compiled by 
MARTHA FOOTE CROW 



Revised Edition, containing 
'Christ and the World War' 




THE WOMANS PRESS 

NEW YORK CITY 

1918 



6 



•f %* C"^ 



^^ 



x^^^ 



Copyright, 1917, 1918, by 

The National Board of the Young Womens Christian Associations 

of the United States of America 

600 Lexington Avenue 

New York City 



OCl -3-jSI9 



©CI,A585354 



We place Thy sacred name upon our brows; 

Our cycles from Thy natal da^^ we score: 
Yet, spite of all our songs and all our vows. 

We thirst and ever thirst to know Thee more. 

For Thou art Mystery and Question still ; 

Even when we see Thee lifted as a sign 
Drawing all men unto that hapless hill 

With the resistless power of Love Divine. 

Still Thou art Question — while rings in our ears 
Thine outcry to a world discord-beset: 

Have I been with thee all these many years, 
Worldy — dost thou not know ME even yetf 

M. F. C. 



% 



CONTENTS 



I 

The Stohy of the Nativity of Jebus 1 

II 
The Youth of Jesus 33 

III 
The Ministrt of Jesus 61 

IV 
The Great Week in Jesus' Life 91 

V 

Christ Triumphant 12S 

VI 

What Think Ye of Christ? 137 

VII 

The World's Jesus 165 

VIII 
Christ and the World War «0S 



I 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

The copyright of this book does not cany with it the 
ownership of the separate poems. These remain the 
possession of the original owners, who have been good 
enough to allow the use of them in this anthology. 
For such use the compiler extends thanks to all the 
pubUshers, periodicals, and poets who have thus made 
the collection possible. 

Acknowledgments are here made to the many 
publishers who have allowed quotations from volumes 
published by them: 

For permission to use a selection from Poems, by 
Meredith Nicholson, copyright, 1906, used by special 
permission of the publishers, the Bobbs-Merrill Com- 
pany. 

To Mr. E. B. Brooks, pubHsher, for permission to 
ase a poem called "The Madonna of the Carpenter 
Shop, " from The Lark Went Singing, by Ruth Guthrie 
Harding. 

To the Century Company for permission to use 
poems from Collected Plays and Poems, by Cale Young 
Rice. 

To the Thomas Y. Crowell Company for permission 
to quote from America the Beautiful and Other Poems, 
by Katharine Lee Bates, and from Poems, by Sophie 
Jewett. 

To the George H. Doran Company for permission 
to quote from The Roadside Fire, copyright, 1912, and 



Life and Living, copyright, 1916, by Amelia Josephine 
Burr; and from Trees and Other Poems, copyright, 1914, 
by Joyce Kilmer. 

To Messrs. Doubleday, Page & Company for per- 
mission to quote from The Shoes of Happiness and 
Other Poems and from Lincoln and Other Poems, by 
Edwin Markham. 

To Messrs. Duffield & Company for permission to 
quote from The Frozen Grail and Other Poems, by Elsa 
Barker. 

To Messrs. Henry Holt & Company for selections 
from Chicago Poems, by Carl Sandburg. 

To the Houghton Mifflin Company for selections 
from Poems and Poetic Dramas, by William Vaughn 
Moody; Complete Poems, by Richard Watson Gilder; 
Poems, by Florence Earle Coates; The Heart of the 
Road, by Anna Hempstead Branch; Songs of America 
and Other Poems, by Edna Dean Proctor; In the High 
Hills, by Maxwell Struthers Burt; A Brief Pilgrimage 
in the Holy Land and A Scallop Shell of Quiet, by 
Caroline Hazard; Happy Ending, by Louise Imogen 
Guiney; and Songs of Sunrise Lands, by Clinton 
ScoUard. 

To Mr. B. W. Huebsch, publisher, for a selection 
from The Free Spirit, by Henry Bryan Binns. 

To the Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Company for selec- 
tions from Lyrics of Brotherhood, by Richard Burton. 

To Mr. David McKay, publisher, for a selection 
from Madrigali, by T. A. Daly. 

To Mr. Mitchell Kennerley for selections from The 
Earth Cry, by Theodosia Garrison; from The Cry of 
Youth, by Harry Kemp; and from The Jew to Jesus 
and Other Poems, by Florence Kiper Frank. 

To the Macmillan Company for selections from 



PoemSy by G. E. Woodberry; from You and /, by 
Harriet Monroe; from Rivers to the Sea, by Sara Teas- 
dale; from The Great V alley , by Edgar Lee Masters; and 
from The Pilgrim Kings, by Thomas Walsh. 

To Messrs. A. C. McClurg & Company for a selec- 
tion from Phidias and Other Poems, by Frank W. Gmi- 
saulus. 

To Mr. Thomas B. Mosher, publisher, for selections 
from A Wayside Lute, by Lizette Woodworth Reese. 

To Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons for selections from 
Fresh Fields and Legends Old and New, by Sarah J. Day. 

To the Fleming H. Re veil Company for selections 
from The Empire of Love, by W. J. Dawson. 

To Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons for selections 
from The Children of the Night, by Edwin Arlington 
Robinson; Poems (copyright, 1911, by Charles Scrib- 
ner's Sons), by Henry van Dyke; and Poems, by 
Sidney Lanier. 

To Messrs. Seymour, Doughaday & Company for 
selections from Lyrics of a Lad, by Scharmel Iris. 

To Messrs. Sherman, French & Company for selec- 
tions from The Wayside Shrine, by Martha E. Pettus; 
A Vanished World, by Douglas Duer; The Border of 
the Lake, by Agnes Lee; and The Beloved Adventure, by 
John Hall Wheelock. 

To Messrs. Small, Maynard & Company for selec- 
tions from Provenga, by Ezra Pound; and from Poems, 
by J. B. Tabb. 

To the Stewart & Kidd Company for a selection 
from The Man Sings (copyright by the Stewart & Kidd 
Company, 1914), by Roscoe Gilmore Stott. 

To Messrs. Sturgis & Walton for selections from 
A Little Book of Homespun Verse, by Margaret E. 
Sangster. 



To the John C. Winston Company for a selection 
from Factories, by Margaret Widdemer. 

To the following periodicals thanks are due for per- 
mission to quote certain poems from their pages:. 
To The Delineator for "The Tears of Mary," by Theo- 
dosia Garrison; to the American Magazine for "Hi;^. 
Playmate," by Harry Kemp; to The Bookman for 
"On Christmas Day," by Georgia Wood Pangborn; to 
the Century Magazine for "My Father and I," by 
Badger Clark, and for "The Blessed Road," by Charles 
Buxton Going; to The Forum for "The Pharisee," by 
Dorothy Landers Beall; to Harper's Bazar for "The 
Twain of Her," by EHzabeth Stuart Phelps Ward;, 
to Richardson Wright, editor of House and Garden, for 
"Gates and Doors," by Joyce Kilmer, and to the 
American Poetry Review for "His Laureate," by the 
same author; to the Frank A. Munsey Company for 
permission to quote the poem, "Judge Me, O Lord," 
by Sarah N. Cleghorn, which appeared in Munsey's 
Magazine; to The Columbiad for permission to use 
poems by Joyce Kilmer which appeared in that publica- 
tion; to the editors of Lippincotfs Magazine for "The 
Magi and the Faery Folk," by Edith Thomas; to The 
Masses for "Comrade Jesus," by Sarah N. Cleghorn; 
to the New York Evening Post for "The Wooden 
Christ," by Martha Foote Crow; to The Survey for 
"The Shadow," by Elizabeth Carter; to the Christian 
Advocate for "The Nazareth Shop," by Robert Mcln- 
tyre; and to The Independent for "A Page from Ameri- 
ca's Psalter" and "John," by Willard Wattles. The 
poem, "The Sepulchre in the Garden," by President 
John Finley, is used by permission of Harper's Maga- 
zine, copyright, 1917, by Harper & Brothers. The 
Outlook gives permission to quote a poem by Robert 



Haven Schauffler called "The White Comrade." The 
author wishes this note to be added: "After W. H. 
Leathem's *The White Comrade/" 

Among the poets mentioned above many were kind 
enough to add their permission to that of the publish- 
ers. The gracious response of the following must be 
here acknowledged: Professor Katharine Lee Bates, 
Amelia Josephine Burr, Richard Burton, Badger Clark, 
Sarah N. Cleghorn, Florence Earle Coates, T. A. Daly, 
Theodosia Garrison, Dr. Frank W. Gunsaulus, Ruth 
Guthrie Harding, Caroline Hazard, Scharmel Iris, Harry 
Kemp, Joyce Kilmer, Agnes Lee, Richard Le Gallienne, 
Charles Buxton Going, Maria Elmendorf Lillie, Edwin 
Markham, Edgar Lee Masters, Harriet Monroe, 
Josephine Preston Peabody, Martha E. Pettus, Lizette 
Woodworth Reese, Cale Young Rice, Edwin Arlington 
Robinson, Carl Sandburg, Robert Haven Schauffler, 
Clinton Scollard, Sara Teasdale, Edith Thomas, 
Thomas Walsh, George Edward Woodberry, and 
Margaret Widdemer. 

Personal acknowledgments are also to be made to 
the following poets and owners of copyright who have 
allowed quotation of poems: to Mr. George M. P. 
Baird for permission to quote a poem called "Mused 
Mary in Old Age," from 'Prentice Songs, and "A Ballad 
of Wise Men," from Rune and Rann; to Marian Pelton 
Guild for permission to use "The Prodigal Son," 
from Semper Plus Ultra; to Mrs. Ella C. Mclntyre for 
the use of "The Nazareth Shop" and "The Mission- 
aries," by Bishop Robert Mclntyre; to Mrs. Harriet 
Moody for permission to quote "Second Coming" and 
"Good Friday Night," by WilKam Vaughn Moody; 
to May Riley Smith for the use of poems from Some- 
times and Other Poems; to William Ralph Erskine for 



"llabboni," by Barbara Peattie Erskine; to Willard 
Wattles for permission to select from a number of his 
poems on this subject which will be gathered by him at 
some future time into a book; to Rev. Carroll Lund 
Bates for permission to quote a poem from The Master; 
to Mr. Herbert D. Ward for the use of "The Twain of 
Her," by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward; to Richard Le 
Gallienne for the use of "The Second Crucifixion," 
from Robert Louis Stevenson and Other Poems; to 
Josephine Preston Peabody for "The Fishers," from 
The Wayfarers; to Richard Burton for "On Syrian 
Hills," from Memorial Day and Other Poems; to Mar- 
garet Widdemer for "Ballad of Wise Men" and '*The 
Old Road to Paradise"; to Clinton Scollard for poems 
that have appeared only in privately printed volumes. 

Certain poets have been good enough to send poems 
in manuscript. Among these Edwina Stanton Babcock 
sent "Told in the Market Place"; Helen Coale Crew, 
"The Cedars of Lebanon"; Robert Haven Schauffler, 
"The White Comrade"; Edith Thomas, "To See the 
New Baby"; Maria Elmendorf Lillie, " Consolator " ; 
Harry Lee, "My Master" and "Madness"; and Mary 
Bowen Brainerd, "The Christ of Raphael's Transfig- 
uration." 

In regard to capitalization, indentation and punctu- 
ation, the precedent of the authors themselves has 
been followed, using the latest editions where possible. 



Beyond the names already mentioned in the above, 
the following have allowed the use of poems for Section 
VIII : James Church Alvord, May Lamberton Becker, 
Isabel Fiske Conant, Hermann Hagedorn, Daniel 
Henderson, Anne Higginson Spicer. Permissions have 
also kindly been given by The Outlook, Contemporary 
Verse, Poetry, Good Housekeeping, E. P. Dutton & 
Company, George H. Doran. 



INTRODUCTION 

That stern prophet. Dr. Josiah Strong, in one of his 
illuminating treatises refers with a fine inadvertence 
to "the return to Christ that is now taking place.'* 
This phrase, like a signboard hidden among the shadows 
of a well-forested pathway, might elude the glance of 
the passer-by. But when I saw it, the inscription 
aroused me to eager question. I had been for a long 
time gathering references to poems about Jesus, just 
because they had a special interest for me, but with 
no definite thought of sharing my finds with others. 
Can it be, I now said, that our poets have all along 
been singing about the events in the life of Jesus and 
I have been deaf to them? 

We had always had poets with us, I realized, who 
had been ranked as pious poets, who had been swept 
to the empyrean by religious themes only. Such poets 
gave their whole attention to adoration, praise and 
prayer. They stood for that. But as for the general 
run of poets — they wrote about love, companionship, 
the joys of nature, the delight of delight, and very 
especially, the sadness of sadness. But very rarely 
was found a poem about Jesus mingled with those 
on life's general problems, or on the beauty of the 



world, or the necessity of enduring bravely the afflic- 
tion of being alive in a world that was felt to be far 
less than a possible best. God was still sitting in a 
far away sky and Christ was thought of as something 
separate from life, as something shut up carefully in a 
place called a church. 

Then I laid aside my slender sheaf of poems about 
Jesus, gathered by chance or in idle moments, and be- 
gan to put the question more definitely to proof. First 
I ran through some fifty volumes of poems of about 
1890. I found few or no poems about Jesus. Then 
I plimged in again at 1895 and found but a lonely one 
here and there. At 1900 there were more, distinctly 
more. At 1905 there was a still brighter dawn. But 
when I came to 1910 and thereabouts, times were 
changed. Something had verily happened. The fas- 
cinating theme of Jesus, the dramatic quality of his 
human career, the miracle of his personality, had been 
discovered; and the position of the poem that il- 
luminated some incident in the life of Christ or that 
enthroned some quality of his character was now 
securely established in nearly every book of poetry. 
I discovered two things: that I had not been deaf to 
the poets' earlier singing about Christ, for they had not 
been singing of Him at all; and also that "the return 
of Christ" was now being delicately registered by the 
poets of to-day in poems of varying distinction and 
with an impulse commensurate with the power of that 
poetic expression that has lately come upon us and that 
promises so much for our future. 

And the poems were often of a new kind never seen 
in books of poetry before. Incidents in his life were 



imaginatively reproduced as nearly as possible in the 
very semblance that they had when He was upon 
earth, and often with a concreteness that is the gift 
of the new poetic impulse of our time. 

Of course each poem of this kind must be considered 
as an expression of the author's own angle of thought. 
But if one considers such a group as is here collected, 
the poems may be thought of as the facets of a dia- 
mond; taken all together they may reflect something 
like the white light of truth. 

Selecting, then, from the superabundant wealth of 
poetical material on this theme, written by the poets 
of the United States of America since about 1900, and 
arranging them in the order of the events of his life, 
we have here a sort of new biography of Jesus, each 
chapter of which consists of a poem written by a dif- 
ferent author, and the whole forming the poetic re- 
action of oiu* time to the thought of Jesus, what He 
was, what his life meant to the world, and, it may be 
added in a separate group, what He might yet be to 
the world if we would but listen to the Voice that still 
rings in our ears. 

That is, roughly speaking, what has been attempted 
in this book. Stringing the gems of poetry upon a golden 
cord of Bible phrases, a poetic biography emerges. 
Then follows a series of comments representing dif- 
ferent historical eras as our poets have imagined the 
Good News spreading circle after circle throughout 
the world. After this the searchlight is cast upon 
our own times, on our hardness and our deafness, on 
our refusals and our brutalities, on our dismay of the 
present moment. Ultimately our poets are gifted to 



see a ray of hope. The White Comrade moves along 
the distracted battle line, the Old Road to Paradise is 
a travelled way, and after the day of utter havoc. 
Brotherhood is to spring anew from ruin. 

Beyond the elisions necessary in trying to cram the 
best of the poetry into small space, but little guidance 
was required in the selection. I hope no theological bent 
is discoverable. Jew and Gentile, Protestant, Roman 
Catholic, Neo-Pagan, Socialist, Emersonian — ^all sorts 
and conditions of lovers and admirers of Jesus are 
represented in this collection. The one rule has been 
only this — does the poem represent a true reverence 
and love? To be entered in this catalog it is not re- 
quired that a poet shall claim that he fully under- 
stands Jesus Christ! 

Martha Foote Crow. 

NOTE TO THE SECOND EDITION 

The edition of 1918 differs but little from that of 1917 
except that a new section has been added, called, 
**Christ and the World War." It has been a source of 
intense gratification to compiler and publisher that the 
anthology has been found helpful to the soldiers in 
camp. To make the book still more so, to make it an in- 
spiration and consolation to the boy in khaki as he takes 
his life in his hands and goes to wage the good warfare 
against Antichrist, for the preservation of all our Christ- 
like ideals, is the aim in the selection of poems that 
compose Section VIII. 

M. F. C. 



I 

THE STORY 

OF THE 

NATIVITY OF JESUS 



CHRIST 

IN THE 

POETRY OF TO-DAY 

Thou shall call his name Jestis. 

God whispered and a silence fell; the world 

Poised one expectant moment like a soul 
Who sees at Heaven's threshold the unfurled 
White wings of cherubim, the, sea impearled. 

And pauses, dazed, to comprehend the whole; 
Only across all space God's whisper came 
And burned about her heart like some white flame. 

Then suddenly a bird's note thrilled the peace. 
And earth again jarred noisily to life 

With a great murmur as of many seas. 

But Mary sat with hands clasped on her knees. 
And lifted eyes with all amazement rife. 

And in her heart the rapture of the Spring 

Upon its first sweet day of blossoming. 

The Annunciation 

Theodosia Garbisok 

3 



IM us now go even unto Bethlehem, 
and see this thing that is come to pass. 

little town, little toion. 

Upon the hills so far. 
We see you, like a thing sublime. 

Across the great gray wastes of time. 
And men go up and men go doton. 

But follow still the star! 

And this is humble Bethlehem 

In the Judean wild; 
And this is lowly Bethlehem 

Wherein a mother smiled; 
Yea, this is happy Bethlehem 

That knew the little Child! 

Aye, this is glorious Bethlehem 
Where He drew living breath 

(Ah, precious, precious Bethlehem! — 
So every mortal saith) 

Who brought to all that tread the earth 
Life's triumph over death! 

little town, little town. 

Upon the hills afar. 
You call to us, a thing sublime. 

Across the great gray wastes of time. 
For men go up and men go down. 

But follow still the star! 

The Little Town 

Clinton Scollard 

4 



And there was no room 
for them in the inn. 



There was a gentle hostler 

(And blessed be his name!) 
He opened up the stable 

The night Our Lady came. 
Our Lady and Saint Joseph, 

He gave them food and bed. 
And Jesus Christ has given him 

A glory round his head. 



So let the gate swing open 

However poor the yard. 
Lest weary people visit you 

And find their passage barred. 
Unlatch the door at midnight 

And let your lantern's glow 
Shine out to guide the traveller's feet 

To you across the snow. 



There was a courteous hostler 
(He is in Heaven to-night!) 

He held Our Lady's bridle 
And helped her to alight. 

He spread clean straw before her 
Whereon she might lie down. 

And Jesus Christ has given him 

An everlasting crown. 
5 



Unlock the door this evening 

And let the gate swing wide. 
Lei all who ash for shelter 

Come speedily inside. 
What if your yard he narrow? 

What if your house he small? 
There is a Guest is coming 

Will glorify it all. 

There was a joyous hostler 

Who knelt on Christmas morn 
Beside the radiant manger 

Wherein his Lord was born. 
His heart was full of laughter. 

His soul was full of bliss 
When Jesus, on His mother's lap, 

Gave him His hand to kiss. 



TJnhar your heart this evening 

And keep no stranger out, 
Take from your souVs great portal 

The harrier of douht. 
To humhle folk and weary 

Give hearty welcoming. 
Your breast shall he to-morrow 

The cradle of a King. 

'Gates and Doors: A Ballad of Christmas Eve 

Joyce Kilmer 

6 



Ye shall find a babe 
wrajp'ped in swaddling clothes, 
and lying in a manger. 



The Ox lie openeth wide the Doore 

And from the Snowe he calls her inne. 

And he hath seen her Smile therefor. 

Our Lady without Sinne. 

Now soone from Sleepe 

A Starre shall leap. 

And soone arrive both King and Hinde; 

Amen, Amen: 
But O, the Place co'd I but find! 



The Ox hath hush'd his voyce and bent 

Trewe eyes of Pitty ore the Mow, 

And on his lovelie Neck, forspent. 

The Blessed layes her Browe. 

Around her feet 

Full Warm and Sweete 

His Bowerie Breath doth meeklie dwell; 

Amen, Amen: 
But sore am I with Vaine Travel. 



The Ox is Host in Judah stall, 

And Host of more than onelie one. 

For close she gathereth withal 

Our Lorde, her littel Sonne: 
7 



Glad Hinde and King 

Their Gyfte may bring, 

But wo'd to-night my Teares were there; 

Amen, Amen: 
Between her Bosom and His hayre! 

Nativity Song 
Louise Imogen Guiney 



My soul doth magnify the Lord. . . 
for he hath looked upon the low estate 
of his handmaid. 

On that divine all-hallowed morn 
When Christ in Bethlehem was born. 
How lone did Mary seem to be. 
The kindly beasts for company! 

But when she saw her infant's face — 
Fair with the soul's unfading grace. 
Softly she wept for love's excess. 
For painless ease and happiness. 

She pressed her treasure to her heart— 

A lowly mother, set apart 

In the dear way that mothers are. 

And heaven seemed high, and earth afar: 

And when grave kings in sumptuous guise 
Adored her babe, she knew them wise; 
For at his touch her sense grew dim — 
So all her being worshipped him. 

8 



A nimbus seemed to crown the head 
Low-nestled in that manger-bed, 
And Mary's forehead, to our sight. 
Wears ever something of its Hght; 

And still the heart — poor pensioner! 
In its affliction turns to her — 
Best love of all, best understood. 
The type of selfless motherhood! 

When Christ Was Born 

Florence Earle Coates 



The cedars of Lebanon, 

where the birds make their nests. 

Murmured all night in cedar'd Lebanon 

The tree-tops' odorous sigh; 
Murmured all night beneath the steadfast stars 

In frosty sky. 

Whisper'd the pines — O softly! where the hills 

Uplifted to the night, 
A plaintive dream-song to the snowy earth 

All virgin white. 

Sighed the tall cedars; fragrant balsams wept; 

The firs and hemlocks moaned; 
While through their tremulous tops the sweeping winds 

Their hymns intoned. 



Think you the green trees slept while Mary grieved 

In pain and travail sore? 
Nay, night-long they watched with her, till at dawn 

Her babe she bore. 

The Cedars of Lebanon 

Helen Coale Crew 



And they came imth haste, 

and found the babe lying in the manger. 

The Little Jesus came to town; 
The wind blew up, the wind blew down; 
Out in the street the wind was bold; 
Now who would house Him from the cold? 

Then opened wide a stable door. 
Fair were the rushes on the floor; 
The Ox put forth a horned head; 
"Come, little Lord, here make Thy bed.'* 

Uprose the Sheep were folded near; 
"Thou Lamb of God, come, enter here." 
He entered there to rush and reed, 
Who was the Lamb of God indeed. 

The little Jesus came to town; 
With ox and sheep He laid Him down; 
Peace to the byre, peace to the fold, 
For that they housed Him from the cold! 

A Christmas Folk-Song 

LiZETTE WOODWORTH ReESE 
10 



Good tidings of great joy 
which shall he to all the people. 



Two little angel-sisters. 

Just called from earth away — 
What brings them back from Heaven, 

At dawning of The Day? 
Two little Bethlehem sisters — 

They had a childish way: 
Where'er was a new baby. 

There, too, full soon were they! 

One might have seen them running 

Along old Bethlehem street . . . 
"Oh, let us see the baby — 

How sweet it is — how sweet! 
And let us touch its hands. 

And let us kiss its feet." 
One might have heard them talking 

To every one they meet. 

When came this Blessed Baby 

They followed Him below . . . 
Their wings are in the shadow. 

Their faces all aglow — 
Save for those wings half-hidden, 

I own, I should not know 
But they were Bethlehem children. 

That just love babies so! 

To See the New Baby 

(to accompany the picture of the 
Nativity by Gherardo delle Notte) 

Edith M. Thomas 
11 



Fear not, Mary: for thou 
hast found favor with God. 

Joseph, the simple tradesman, sat near by. 
Awed by his wonder, stilled by sympathy; 
Vaguely he mused on what his eyes had seen, 
Or pondered slowly what the morn might mean. 
Mary slept on — ^that first blest mother-sleep; 
He watched alone; the night was growing deep. 
Amazed he marked new glory flood her face; 
Her eyes were closed, but from her lowly place 
She called his name, as one who dreams a dream. 
And as he came, her face did strangely gleam. 
Her arms lay open, and with knowing glance, 
He knew he heard her speaking in a trance. 

"Look, Joseph, on my Babe — ^He is a King! 

Come near and touch my hand; I hear the ring 

Of wondrous anthems bursting from the sky; 

I am bewildered and I know not why. 

Look, sleeps He well? Ah, Joseph, bear with me 

In loving patience as thou hast, for we — 

Joseph, they sing again! Hear ye the choir .^^ 

Their faces shine as with a sacred fire. 

They hover near us — O, a mighty throng 

Are singing for my Babe His natal-song! 

Before His star a thousand stars take flight — 

Who placed it there, that wondrous, holy Light? 

My joy — dear Joseph, can I bear it all? 

My joy! — ^Ah, see around me fall 
12 



The dismal shadows of a distant cross! — 
My fathers' God, is all this gain or loss?" 

And Joseph — ^for he could not understand — 
Knelt by her side and, wond'ring, kissed her hand. 

Joseph and Mary 
RoscoE Oilman Stott 



And there were shepherds in the same country, 
keeping toaich hy night over their Hock 

First Shepherd, a youth: 

I saw a wonder as I came along: 
Out of the sky there dropped a shining song. 
I do not know if stars ill heaven have wings; 
But look, and listen! — there it soars and sings. 

Second Shepherd, an old man: 

My eyes are dazzled for the light is strong. 

The Angel: 

I bring good tidings, snepherds, have no fear: 
The Saviour of the whole world is come near. 
A child is born to-night in Bethlehem 
Who brings great joy to all, and most to them 
Who are most poor. The King ! The Ejng is here I 

First Shepherd: 

Where is his palace? Can we find the way? 
Second Shepherd: 

We have had kings enough. Must we go pay 

More taxes to a new one? 
13 



The Angel: 

Come and bring 
The love of simple hearts unto this king. 

Third Shepherd, a man of middle age: 
I could bring only tears where a child lay. 

First Shepherd (aside): 

Why can he not forget his year-old pain? 

Second Shepherd (aside): 
Hearts that break slowly will not heal again. 

The Angel: 
Good-will, good-will, and peace to all the earth 
Born in a cattle stable, lo! his birth 
Is holy. King of Love, he comes to reign. 

Third Shepherd: 
When harvests fail, and all the sheep are dead. 
And Kttle childreli cry and cry for bread. 
Grow tired at last, and sicken and lie still. 
Will any sing of peace there and good-will 
To us who watch beside an empty bed? 

First Shepherd: 

I think that when the King of Love is grown, 
And hearts of men are loving like his own. 
He who has gold will with his brother share; 
There will be bread and wine and fire to spare; 
For who can love, yet sit and feast alone? 

Second Shepherd: 

Quick, let us go! These dim old eyes would see 

A king who comes in peace and poverty. 
14 



First Shepherd: 

I see a hundred white stars drifting down; 

They circle yonder over Bethlehem town. 
Chorus of Angels: 

Glory to God! Good- will to men shall be? 

The Shepherds 

Sophie Jewett 



We saw his star in the east. 

Softly I come into the dance of the spheres 
Into the choir of lights. 

New from my nest in God's heart. 
O Night, the chosen of nights. 
Longing and dream of the years. 
Blessed thou art! 

Golden the fruit hangs on the hyaline tree; 
Golden the glistening tide 

Sweeps through the hdavens; the cars 
Of the great mooned planets glide 
Golden; and yet to me 
Bow down the stars; 

Casting their crowns, bright with seonian reigns. 

Under the flight of my feet 
Eager for Bethlehem, 

Thither with music-beat 

Blent of innumerous strains 

MarshalHng them. 

15 



Sweetly their chant soars through unsearchable space. 
Quivering vespers that thrill 

Into the deep nocturne, 
Symphony I fulfill, 
I who like Mary's face 
Wonder and yearn. 

Cherish, adore, keeping the watch above 
The Word made flesh to-night. 

Wonderful Word impearled 
In childhood holy-white, 
Word that is Godhood, Love, 
Light of the World. 

The Star of Bethlehem 

Katharine Lee Bates 



And lo, the star, which they s 
in the east, went before them. 



The Kings of the East are riding 

To-night to Bethlehem. 
The sunset glows dividing. 
The Kings of the East are riding; 
A star their journey guiding. 

Gleaming with gold and gem 

The Kings of the East are riding 

To-night to Bethlehem. 
16 



II 

To a strange sweet harp of Zion 
The starry host troops forth; 

The golden-glaived Orion 

To a strange sweet harp of Zion; 

The Archer and the Lion, 
The Watcher of the North; 

To a strange sweet harp of Zion 
The starry host sweeps forth. 

Ill 

There beams above a manger 

The child-face of a star; 
Amid the stars a stranger. 
It beams above a manger; 
What means this ether-ranger 

To pause where poor folk are? 
There beams above a manger 

The child-face of a star. 

The Kings of the East 

Katharine Lee Bates 

The star eame and stood over 
where the young child toas. 

The day the Christ-child's tender eyes 
Unveiled their beauty on the earth, 

God lit a new star in the skies 
To flash the message of his birth; 

And wise men read the glowing sign, 

And came to greet the Child divine. 
17 



Low kneeling in the stable's gloom, 
Their precious treasures they unrolled; 

The place was rich with sweet perfume; 
Upon the floor lay gifts of gold. 

And thus adoring they did bring 

To Christ the earliest offering. 

I think no nimbus wreathed the head 
Of the young King so rudely throned; 

The quilt of hay beneath Him spread 
The sleepy kine beside Him owned; 

And here and there in the torn thatch 

The sky thrust in a starry patch. 

Oh, when was new-born monarch shrined 

Within such canopy as this.? 
The birds have cradles feather lined; 

And for their new babes princesses 
Have sheets of lace without a flaw, — 
His pillow was a wisp of straw! 

He chose this way, it may have been, 
That those poor mothers, everywhere. 

Whose babies in the world's great inn 
Find scanty cradle-room and fare. 

As did the babe of Bethlehem, 

May find somewhat to comfort them. 

His Birthday 
May Riley Smith 

18 



And Ms name shall be called 
Prince of Peace. 

The Christ-Child lay in Bethlehem, 

And the Wise Men gave Him gold. 
And Mary-Mother she hearkened them 

As they prayed in the cattle-fold: 
"Smile, then smile, little Prince of Earth, 

Smile in Thy holy sleep; 
Now Thou art come, for want and dearth 
There shall be plenty and light and mirth 

Through lands where the poor folk weep." 

But Mary-Mother was still and pale 
And she raised her gold-ringed head: 

"Then why have I heard the children wail 

All night long on the far-blown gale 
While my own Child slept?" she said. 

{But far over head the angels sang; 

" There shall be peaceF* the far notes rang.) 

The Christ-Child lay in Bethlehem 

And the censers burned for Him 
That the Wise Men swung on a silver stem, 

And prayed while the smoke rose dim: 
"Sleep, then sleep, little Son of God, 

Sleep while the whole world prays: 
All of the world shall fear thy nod. 
Following close thy staff and rod 

Praising this day of days.'* 

19 



But Mary-Mother turned whispering 

There by the manger-bed: 
"Then why do I hear a mocking ring 
Of voices crying and questioning 

Through the scented smoke?" she said. 
{Bid high over head the angels sang; 
" There shall be faith!" the sweet notes rang.) 

The Christ-Child lay in Bethlehem 

And the Wise Men gave Him myrrh 
And Mary-Mother she hearkened them 

As they prayed by the heart of her; 
*'Hush, then hush, little Prince of Peace, 

Hush, take Thy holy rest; 
Now Thou art come all wars shall cease. 
Thou who hast brought all strife release 

Even from East to West!" 

But Mary-Motner she veiled her head 

As if her great joys were lost: 
And "Here is only a manger-bed, 
Then why do I hear clashed swords?" she said, 
"And why do I see a tide of red 

Over the whole world tossed?" 
(But still over all the angels sang: 
"There shall be peace!" the high notes rang!) 

A Ballad of the Wise Men 

Margaret Widdembr 

20 



And opening their treasures 
they offered unto him gifts. 

I am Balthazar, sovereign where the Nile 
Winds over Egypt by the palms and sands. 
Temples and sphinxes waiting Thy commands 

Adown the ages in a deathless smile. 

Thee would our priests with fire and bloodshed style 
A "God of Terrors," yet the mummies* hands 
Held fast the scarab so that shadow-lands 

Of death might know Thou didst but bide the while! 

Thus for Thy Kingship did I snatch the gold 
From grim Osiris' brow, that night the Star 

For which Chaldea's sages pined of old 

Proclaimed Thy birth; and trusting in the sign. 

Come I to seek Thee on the hills afar. 
To yield Fear's broken sovereignty to Thine! 

Behold me — Gaspar of the Isles of Greece — 
Before Thy feet anointed! Thou didst call 
Our souls to dream of Thee by waterfall 

And snow-strewn mount and purple vale of peace» 

Out where our sea-flocks comb their silver fleece 
Against a thousand isles marmoreal 
We raised to Thee our temple columns tall 

Where sacrifice and psean should not cease. 

What though the Phidian stone or ivory heard 
The cry our barren hearts sent up to Thee, 
Yet did we treasure every Delphic word 

21 



And ply the sibyls in Thine augury. 
Such was our homage till yon pure Star stirred 
Before me bearing incense o'er the sea. 

They crowned me — Melchior — where the Ganges rolls 
By gilded shrines and cities to the sea. 
There where the death-pyres burn eternally 

And saints and sages lacerate their souls. 

Through scorn of love and hate their will controls 
Earth's rebel senses; naught of worth can be 
Save full absorption in the life of Thee, 

Their Lamp consuming o'er the deeps and shoals. 

Thou dost confound the dreaming of our seers. 
Thou who in human guise, not flame, wouldst bring 

Our world Thy message of its precious tears, 
Its humblest service angel-winged with thought. 

So hither unto Thee, O Saviour, — King, — 
And Brother, — lo, the myrrh adoring brought! 

At the Manger's Side 

Thomas Walsh 



Se thai vnll, let Mm take 
the wcUer of life freely. 

When that our gentle Lord was born 

And cradled in the hay 

There rode three wise men from the east- 



Three rich wise men were they — 
All in the starry night they came 
Their homage gifts to pay. 

They got them down from camel-back. 

The cattle shed before. 

And in the darkness vainly sought 

A great latch on the door, 

"Ho! this is strange," quoth Balthazar, 

"Aye, strange," quoth Melchior. 

Quoth Gaspar, "I can find no hasp; 
Well hidden is the lock"; 
"The door," quoth Melchior, "is stout 
And fast, our skill to mock"; 
Quoth Balthazar, "The little King 
Might wake, we dare not knock." 

The three wise men they sat them down 
To wait for morning dawn. 
The cunning wards of that old door 
They thought and marvelled on; 
Quoth they, "No gate in all the East 
Hath bar-bolts tighter drawn." 

Anon there came a little lad 

With lambskins for the King, 

He had no key, he raised no latch, 

He touched no hidden spring, 

But gently pushed the silent door 

And open it gan swing. 
23 



"A miracle! a miracle!" 

Cried out the wise men three; 

"A little child hath solved the locks 

That could not opened be." 

In wonder spake the shepherd lad, 

"It hath no locks," quoth he. 

A Ballad of Wise Men 

George M. P. Baird 



That in the ages to come he might show 
the exceeding riches of his grace. 

Where went the gifts the Magi bore 

To Bethlehem Village long of yore? 

As they rode all night through the haunting sands, 

There were whispering voices and touching hands: 

"Give us of that which your panniers hold!" 

Then they who rode to each other spoke: 

"They have followed us forth because of our gold — 

The eager clan of the Faery Folk!" 

And the Magi answered those voices in air: 
"The gifts we carry we may not share. 
The myrrh and the gems and the gold from the mine— 
These are all for One — for a Child Divine." 
Oh, then, how the silver laughters ran 
Till they made to quiver the Guiding Star: 
"We will visit, ourselves, this Child of Man, 
We will ask of Him when ye're passed afar! 

24 



"All that He hath He will give away — 

In the hands of the world a treasure will lay, 

Treasure so vast, so more than gold. 

That the hands of the world will scarcely hold 

All that He hath for them in store: 

We have no souls, that treasure to share; 

He will give us the lesser — the glittering ore!" 

Laughed the Faery Folk, unseen in air. 

Thus, with the touch of asking hands. 
The Magi rode through the haunted sands 
And silently followed their Guiding Star. 
They gave their gifts, and they passed afar. 
If any came after, there's none to tell. 
And where went their gold is none to say. 
But this of a truth we know full well: 
'^All that He hath He will give away,'* 

The Magi and the Faery Folk 

Edith M. Thomas 



And the 'power of the Most High 
shall overshadow thee. 

Methinks the Blessed was content, her journey over- 
past, 

Amid the drowsy, wondering kine on lowly bed to lie: 

To dream in pensive thankfulness, and happy days 
forecast. 

While over her the Star of Hope waxed brighter in 
the sky. 

25 



And yet, methinks in Bethlehem her spirit had been 

lone 
But for the tender new-born joy that in her arms she 

bore, — 
Ay, even though with gifts of gold and many a precious 

stone 
Great kings had knelt with shepherd folk about her 

stable door. 

But every mortal mother's heart knows its Gethsem- 

ane — 
That lonelier spot whereto no star the light of hope 

may bring — 
Yet even in the darkest hour, amidst her agony. 
Each still remembers Bethlehem, and hears the angels 
sing. 

Mother Mary 
Florence Earle Coates 



But there were standing by the cross 
of Jesus his mother and . 

Melchior, Gaspar, Balthazar, 
Great gifts they bore and meet; 

White linen for His body fair 
And purple for His feet; 

And golden things — the joy of kings 
And myrrh to breathe Him sweet. 



It was the shepherd Terish spake, 

"Oh, poor the gift I bring — 
A little cross of broken twigs, 

A hind's gift to a king — 
Yet, haply, He may smile to see 

And know my offering.'* 

And it was Mary held her Son 

Full softly to her breast, 
"Great gifts and sweet are at Thy feet 

And wonders king-possessed, 
O little Son, take Thou the one 

That pleasures Thee the best." 

It was the Christ-Child in her arms 
Who turned from gaud and gold. 

Who turned from wondrous gifts and great. 
From purple woof and fold. 

And to His breast the cross He pressed 
That scarce His hands could hold. 

'Twas king and shepherd went their way — 

Great wonder tore their bliss; 
'Twas Mary clasped her little Son 

Close, close to feel her kiss. 
And in His hold the cross lay cold 

Between her heart and His! 

The Ballad of the Cross 

Theodosia Garrison 

27 



And a sword shall pierce through thine own soul; 
that thoughts out of many hearts shall be revealed. 

Vines branching stilly 
Shade the open door. 
In the house of Zion's Lily 
Cleanly and poor. 
Oh, brighter than wild laurel 
The Babe bounds in her hand. 
The King, who for apparel 
Hath but a swaddling band. 
And sees her heavenlier smiling than stars in His 
command ! 

Soon, mystic changes 
Part Him from her breast. 
Yet there awhile He ranges 
Gardens of rest: 
Yea, she the first to ponder 
Our ransom and recall, 
Awhile may rock Him under 
Her young curls' fall, 
Against that only sinless love-loyal heart of all. 

What shall inure Him 

Unto the deadly dream, 

When the tetrarch shall abjure Him, 

The thief blaspheme. 

And scribe and soldier jostle 

About the shameful tree, 

28 



And even an Apostle 
Demand to touch and see? 
But she hath kissed her Flower where the Wounds 
are to be. 

Nativity Song 
Louise Imogen Guiney 



Behold, this child is set 
for a sign. 

^^Nayy but He is so helpless and so sweet. 

Why, it is nothing more than if I pressed 

An armful of white roses to my breast. 

That only stir above my own hearfs beat. 

Why should a dream I dreamed destroy my rest?* 

Yet even as she spake she felt the stir 

Of wings that in the garden passed by her. 

*'He is so small, so weak against my heart, 
A little wounded dove were strong as He. 
He hath no other need than need of me. 
Nor any life from my own life apart. 
Why should I dread an olden prophecy?" 
Yet even as she spake, she felt, like flame. 
The voice that in the garden said her name. 

"As lesser mothers are, am I not blest? 
He is no other's but mine own, mine own. 
No King, no Prophet, but my child alondr 

29 



Asking no other kingdom than my breast. 
Let me be glad those foolish fears are done.'' 
Yet even as she spake He stirred in her embrace. 
Feeling her tears, her tears— upon His face. 

The Tears of Mary 

Theodosia Garrison 



Fear not, Mary: of his kingdom 
there shall be no end! 

O Mary, in thy clear young eyes 
What sorrow came at His first cry? 
What hint of how He was to die 

Disturbed thee in the calm sunrise . . . 
What shadow from the paling sky 

Did fall across thy Paradise? 

Dream'st thou the Garden, and the Tree? 
Know they were for the little Child 
Whose lips against thy warm breast smiled? 

So sweet, that body close to thee, 
By men's rough hands to be defiled; 

So frail . . . yet waiting Calvary! 

Stanzas from " The Madonna of the Carpenter Shop** 

(Dagnan-Bougeret) 

Ruth Guthrie Harding 

30 



Whosoever shall do the will of Godf the same 
is my brother, and sister, and mother. 

Three women meet beneath the Tree of Knowledge in Para- 
dise; one has given up her birthright of motherhood that 
she might give her life entirely to the work of healing; the 
second has found her children in her songs; the third has 
never been sought, and has had to content herself with 
caring for the neglected children of others. 

And then, on still, unhasting feet 
One came to them with greeting brief. 
Her smile so patient and so sweet 
Was sadder than a rain of grief, 
And as they looked into her eyes 
Such silence fell upon the three 
They heard the songs of Paradise 
Beneath the Knowledge Tree. 
"And I — " she said — "a child I bore — 
A child I could not understand. 
I watched Him wander more and more 
Beyond the limits of my land. 
His love was never less toward me, 
But He was All, and I but one. 
He passed unto Humanity, 
And was no more my son." 

The Childless 

Amelia Josephine Burr 

31 



And his father and mother were marveling 

at the things which were spoken concerning him. 

After the Wise Men went, and the strange star 
Had faded out, Joseph the father sat 
Watching the sleeping Mother and the Babe, 
And thinking stern, sweet thoughts the long night 
through. 

"Ah, what am I, that God has chosen me 
To bear this blessed burden, to endure 
Daily the presence of this loveliness. 
To guide this Glory that shall guide the world? 

"Brawny these arms to win Him bread, and broad 
This bosom to sustain Her. But my heart 
Quivers in lonely pain before that Beauty 
It loves — and serves — and cannot understand!" 

The Vigil of Joseph 

Elsa Babkeb 



n 

THE YOUTH OF JESUS 



He led them also by a straight way, 
that they might go to a city of habitation. 

Thou wayfaring Jesus, a pilgrim and stranger. 

Exiled from Heaven by love at Thy birth. 
Exiled again from Thy rest in the manger, 

A fugitive child 'mid the perils of earth, — 
Cheer with Thy fellowship all who are weary. 

Wandering far from the land that they love; 
Guide every heart that is homeless and dreary. 

Safe to its home in Thy presence above. 

The Flight into Egypt 

Henry van Dykb 



And Joseph arose and took the young child 
and his mother and fled into Egypt. 

The mighty river flo^vs as when Thine eyes 
Thy baby eyes, in wonder saw it flow. 
The Pyramids stand there; no one may know 

Their countless years, or ancient builders wise; 

Thy childish gaze was caught in glad surprise 

To see the haughty camels come and go; 

The ass thy mother rode still ambles slow; 
35 



Unmoved by centuries the country lies. 

Up from the calm, the peace, the mystic land. 
Back to the scene of conflict and of strife. 
Thy parents journeyed at the Lord's command. 

A touch of glory rests upon the place 

Which gave its shelter to Thine infant grace. 
And nourished Thee to be the Life of Life. 

Out of Egypt Have I Called My Son 

Caroline Hazard 



And the grace of God was wpon him. 

Could every time-worn heart but see Thee once again 
A happy human child, among the homes of men. 
The age of doubt would pass, — -the vision of Thy face 
Would silently restore the childhood of the race. 

The Nativity 

Henry van Dtke 



That it might he fulfilled which was spoken 

through the prophets, that he should be called a Nazarene. 

In Nazareth, upon its southern slope 

Of springtime hillside, lying in the sun 

With fresh grass from the winter hardly won 

And blossoms that begin with joy to ope — 

36 



The lily of the field, in heliotrope 

And splendid crimson, such as Solomon 
In glory had not — the Angelic One 

Brought all to life, with those great words of hope. 

And from the crest of that fair mountain town 
Far to the north, the height the Prophet sings. 
The dome of dazzling snow, the country's crown. 

The splendid majesty of Hermon lies, 
The joy of His forefather David's eyes. 
White as the herald angel's radiant wings. 

Nazareth 

Caroline Hazard 



And the life was the light of men. 

A woman sings across the wild 
A song of wonder sweet. 
And everywhere her little Child 
Follows her gliding feet. 

He flutters like a petal white 
Along the roadway's rim; 
When He is tired, at latter-light. 
His mother carries Him. 

Sometimes a little silver star 

Floats softly down the air. 

Past mountains where the pure snows are, 

And sits upon His hair. 
37 



Sometimes, when darkness is unfurled, 
Up>on her breast He lies. 
And all the dreams of all the world 
Flock to His dreamy eyes. 

The Christ-Child 

Agnes Lee 



One of these little ones. 



And have you seen my little Son 

A-passing by to-day? 
A butterfly with golden wings 

Has lured Him far away. 

Oh, you would know Him by His eyes; 

Twin pools of twilight sweet, 
Oh, you would know Him by His smile. 

And by His httle feet. 

And if you find Him, give Him drink. 

And give Him of your bread. 
And mother Him upon your breast, 

And stroke His weary head; 

And should a thorn have bruised His hand, 

I beg you, wash the stain; 

And oh, pray lead Him to my hearth. 

And to my arms again. 
38 



For I would place Him in my bed. 
And close His tender eyes. 

And lay my heart anear His heart. 
And dream of Paradise. 



Mary^s Quest 

ScHARMEL Iris 



And he took them in his arms and blessed them. 

Where has He gone, our Playmate? 

We've sought Him high and low 
Where gray-green olives ripen. 

Where haycocks stand a-row. . . . 

W^e saw Him passing down the street 
An hour or so ago! 

Where has He gone, our Comrade 

Who took us by the hand 
And taught us to build houses 

With little heaps of sand? 

He has gone forth to sojourn 
In a far foreign land! 

Nay, but He would not leave us 
Who took us on His knee, 



And set our fancies sailing 
Like ships upon the sea. . . . 

We think that He will never come 
Again to Galilee! 

The Playmate 

Harry Kemp 



And his name shall he called Counsellor. 

A little Child, a Joy-of-heart, with eyes 
Unsearchable, he grew in Nazareth, 

His daily speech so innocently wise 

That all the town went telling: "Jesus saith." 

At Nazareth 

Katharine Lee Bates 



As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, 
90 Jehovah is round about his people! 

I stood by the Holy City 

Without the Damascus Gate, 
While the wind blew soft from the distant sea. 

And the day was wearing late. 
And swept its wide horizon 

With reverent lingering gaze 

From the rolling uplands of the west 

That slope a hundred ways, 
40 



To Olivet's gray terraces 

By Kedron's bed that rise, 
Upon whose crest the Crucified 

Was lost to mortal eyes; 
And, far beyond, to the tawny line 

Where the sun seemed still to fall — 
So bright the hue against the blue. 

Of Moab's mountain wall; 
And north to the hills of Benjamin, 

Whose springs are flowing yet, 
Ramah, and sacred Mizpah, 

Its dome above them set; 
And the beautiful words of the Psalmist 

Had meaning before unknown: 
As the mountains are round Jerusalem 

The Lord is round His own. 

At Jerusalem 

Edna Dean Proctor 



Theff found him in the temple, 
titling in the midst of the teachers, 
ashing them questions. 

The young child, Christ, is straight and wise 

And asks questions of the old men, questions 

Found under running water for all children. 

And found under shadows thrown on still waters 

By tall trees looking downwards, old and gnarled. 

Found to the eyes of children alone, untold, 

41 



Singing a low song in the loneliness. 

And the young child, Christ, goes asking 

And the old men answer nothing and only know love 

For the young child, Christ, straight and wise. 

Child 

Carl Sandbubg 



Knew ye not that I must he 
in my Father's house? 

What is it forces men to overrun 

Their safe and common paths, to meet the frown 
Of those they reverence, jeered by every clown, 

Ejiowing no rest till some strange task is done. 

Some luring secret from the darkness won? 
What is it makes life, love, and fair renown 
As naught — its far-off prize the martyr's crown? 

'Tis God's great business, claiming thus His son. 

So was it with the Boy Divine. Apart 

From those calm travellers on their homeward way. 

He needs must utter from His questioning heart 
The burden that already on it lay; 

And she who gently drew Him from the spot 

Trembled, methinks, at that presaging "Wist ye not?" 

My Father's Business 

Sarah J. Day 

42 



S0 many kinds of voices in the toorld . . . 
Christ reconciling the world unto himself. 

Little town of Nazareth 
On the hillsides Galileany 
Oh, your name is like a poean 

Rising over dole and death! 

I can see your domes and towers 
Dazzle underneath the noon. 

And your drowsy poppy-flowers 
In the breezes sway and swoon. 

I can see your oHves quiver 
With their opalescent sheen, 

Like the ripples of a river 
Gliding grassy banks between. 

I can see your graceful daughters 
Poise their slim-necked drinking-jars. 

With their hair like twilight waters. 
And their eyes like Syrian stars. 

I can see your narrow byways 
Where the folk go sandal-shod, — 

AH your dim bazaars and highways. 
Every path that once He trod. 

And I know that waking, sleeping. 

Until time has ceased to be. 

You will hold fast in your keeping 

His beloved memory! 
43 



Little town of Nazareth 
On the hillsides Galilean, 
Ohy your name is like a pcean 

Rising over dole and death! 



Easter at Nazareth 

Clinton Scollard 



And he was subject unto them. 

So sweetly through that humble home 
The rippling laughter went 

That Mary felt the world's blue dome 
Too small for her content. 

And careful Joseph, while he held 

The boy in grave caress. 
Wist not what tender thrill dispelled 

His workday weariness. 

The crown set softly, only rings 

Of baby hair agleam 
With lustres dropt from angels' wings 

And starlight down a dream. 

The thorn-tree was a seedling still. 

And with laughter's frolic chime 

The Christ-child did his father's will. 

As when, of elder time, 
44> 



A ruddy lad in Bethlehem 

Was keeping sheep and played 

Blithe music on his harp to them 
Before the psalms were made. 

MurilWs **Holy Family of the Little Bird*' 

Katharine Lee Bates 



And Jesus advanced 
in wisdom and stature. 



I know. Lord, Thou hast sent Him- 
Thou art so good to me! — 
But Thou hast only lent Him, 
His heart's for Thee! — 

I dared — Thy poor handmaiden — 
Not ask a prophet-child: 
Only a boy-babe laden 
For earth — and mild. 

But this one Thou hast given 
Seems not for earth — or me! 
His lips flame truth from heaven, 
And vanity 

Seem all my thoughts and prayers 

When He but speaks Thy law; 

Out of my heart the tares 

Are torn by awe! 
45 



I cannot look upon Him, 
So strangely burn His eyes — 
Hath not some grieving drawn Him 
From Paradise? 

For Thee, for Thee I'd live, Lord! 
Yet oft I almost fall 
Before Him — Oh, forgive. Lord, 
My sinful thrall! 

But e'en when He was nursing, 
A baby at my breast. 
It seemed He was dispersing 
The world's unrest. 



»» 



Thou badst me call Him "Jesus, 
And from our heavy sin 
I know He shall release us, 
From Sheol win. 

But, Lord, forgive! the yearning 
That He may sometimes be 
Like other children, learning 
Beside my knee. 

Or playing, prattling, seeking 
For help — comes to my heart . « . 
Oh sinful. Lord, I'm speaking — 
How good Thou art! 

Mary at Nazareth 

Cale Young Rice 

46 



And the government shall be 
upon his shoulder. 

When, for the last time from His mother's home 

The Son went forth, foreseeing perfectly 
What doom would happen, and what things would 
come. 
Was there upon His lips no stifled sigh 
For happy hours that should return no more. 

Long days among the lilies, pure delights 
Of wanderings by Gahlee's fair shore. 
And converse with His friends on starry nights? 

Yet brave He stepped into the setting sun 

With this one word, "Father, Thy will be 
done!" 

With a low voice the stooping olive trees 

Whispered to Him of His Gethsemane; 
The cruel thorn-bush, clinging to His knees. 

Proclaimed, "I shall be made a crown for Thee!" 
And, looking back. His eyes made dim with loss. 

He saw the lintel of the cottage grow 
In shape against the sunset, like a cross. 

And knew He had not very far to go. 

Yet brave He stepped into the setting sun. 
Still saying this one word, "Thy will be done!" 

So, when the last time, from His mother's home 
The Son passed out, no choir of angels came. 

As long before at Bethlehem they had come. 
To comfort Him upon the road of shame. 

47 



Alone He went, and stopped a Kttle space. 

As one o'erburdened, stopped to look again 
Upon His mother's pleading form and face. 

And wept for her, that she should know this pain. 
Then, silently. He faced the setting sun. 
And said, "Oh, Father, let Thy will be done!" 

Mother and Son 

W. J. Dawsom 



For even his brethren 
did not believe on him. 

Joses, the brother of Jesus, plodded from day to day 
With never a vision within him to glorify his clay; 
Joses, the brother of Jesus, was one with the heavy 

clod. 
But Christ was the soul of rapture, and soared, like a 

lark, with God. 
Joses, the brother of Jesus, was only a worker in wood. 
And he never could see the glory that Jesus, his 

brother, could. 
"Why stays he not in the workshop.?'* he often used 

to complain, 
"Sawing the Lebanon cedar, imparting to woods their 

stain? 
Why must he go thus roaming, forsaking my father's 

trade. 

While hammers are busily sounding, and there is gain 

to be made?" 

48 



Thus ran the mind of Joses, apt with plummet and 

rule, 
And deeming whoever surpassed him either a knave 

or a fool, — 
For he never walked with the prophets in God's great 

garden of bliss — 
And of all mistakes of the ages, the saddest, methinks, 

was this 
To have such a brother as Jesus, to speak with him 

day by day. 
But never to catch the vision which glorified his clay. 

Joses, the Brother of Jesus 

Harry Kemp 



Is not this the carpenter's son? 

I wish I had been His apprentice, to see Him each 
morning at seven. 

As He tossed His gray tunic far from Him, the Master 
of earth and of heaven. 

When He lifted the lid of His work chest and opened 
His carpenter's kit 

And looked at His chisels and augers, and took the 
bright tools out of it 

While He gazed at the rising sun tinting the dew on 
the opening flowers 

And smiled as He thought of His Father, whose love- 
floods this planet of ours, 
49 



When He fastened His apron about Him, and put on 

His working-man's cap, 
And grasped the smooth hasp of the hammer, to give 

the bent woodwork a tap. 
Saying, "Lad, let me finish this ox yoke. The farmer 

must put in his crop." 
O, I wish I had been His apprentice and worked in 

the Nazareth shop! 



Some wish they had been on Mount Tabor, to hearken 

unto His high speech 
When the quick and the dead were beside Him, He 

holding communion with each. 
Some wish they had heard the soft accents that stilled 

the wee children's alarms, 
When He won the sweet babes from their mothers and 

folded them fast in His arms. 
Some wish they had stood by the Jordan when holy 

John greeted Him there 
And seen the white dove of the Spirit fly down o'er 

the path of His prayer. 
Some wish they had seen the Redeemer when into the 

basin He poured 
The water, and, girt with a towel, the servant of all 

was the Lord. 
But for me, if I had the choosing, O this would them 

all overtop. 

To work all day steady beside Him, of old in the 

Nazareth shop. 

50 



These heavenly wonders would fright me, I cannot 

approach to them yet. 
But, O, to have seen Him, when toiling. His forehead 

all jeweled with sweat, 
To hear Him say softly, "My helper, now bring me 

the level and rule." 
To hear Him bend over and teach me the use of the 

artisan's tool. 
To hear Him say, "This is a sheep gate, to keep in 

the wandering flock," 
Or, "This is stout oaken house sill. I hope it will 

rest on a rock." 
And sometimes His mother might bring us our meal 

in the midsummer heat. 
Outspread it so simply before us, and bid us sit down 

and eat. 
Then with both of us silent before Him, the blessed 

Messiah would stop 
To say grace, and a tremulous glory would fill the 

Nazareth shop. 

The Nazareth Shop 

Robert McIntyre 



The measure of the stature 
of the fullness of ChristI 

And yet the daily task is sacred too. 

And he who serves the Highest will not spurn 

The humbler service, nor unloving turn 

From claims of human kinship. No less true 
51 



A mastery of our wills is that which through 
Apprenticeship to other wills we learn. 
Not servile, yet submissive to discern 

God's bidding when a lowlier bids to do. 

So through those silent unrecorded years 
The matchless life grew slowly into power. 

Brooding its mystery of hopes and fears 
And moving ever forward toward the hour 

When He who first had served at Nazareth 

Life's Lord became, obedient unto Death, 

Was Subject Unto Them 

Sarah J. Day 



A workman that needeth not to be ashamed, 
handling aright the word of truth. 

The altar flame was white, the flowers red. 

Through the hushed chancel, from the altar side. 

Came the priest's prayer before the Living Bread, 
He prayed, "O Victim, opening wide — '* 

Rough scaffolding outside a shadow threw 
On the tall window, veiled to hide the sun. 

Crossbeams and bars, a tracery that grew 
To a mute symbol of the day begun. 

For, climbing, pausing, noiseless as a thought. 
Black on the amber curtain's narrow span. 

Among the bars and beams his hands had wrought. 
There rose and crossed the shadow of a man. 

52 



A man — a carpenter. What breath of awe 
Swept cold across our prayer-wrapt ecstasy. 

In place of lights and kneeling priest, we saw 
A workman's home in far-off Galilee. 

Thy Church, Thy brother workman ! — This we know- 
(Help us, O Christ, the gulf is deep and wide!) 

We kneel in peace where the tall candles glow. 
Thy brother workmen face the world — outside. 

The Shadow 

Elizabeth Carter 



Can any good thing come out of Nazareth? 
Philip saith unto him. Come and see. 

Nazareth town in Galilee! 

Set where the paths lead up from the sea 

That like the chords of a mighty lyre 

Dirges over the rocks of Tyre, 

Mourns where the piers of Sidon shone. 

And the battlements of Ascalon. 

They have waned as the sunset wanes; 

Little more than a name remains; 

But more than a name we hold it, — we, — 

Nazareth town in Galilee! 

Nazareth town in Galilee! 

Ah, what a golden harmony 

The dawn seems, flooding its bright white walls! 

And, when the violet twilight falls, 
53 



What vast processional of stars 
Pageants over its stilled bazaars! 
And when the full moon touches the height 
Of Tabor, a torch of brilliant light. 
Never was sight more fair to see; — 
Nazareth town in Galilee! 

Nazareth town in Galilee! 

Strumming a desert melody. 

The Bedouin minstrel trolls in the street; 

At the Well of the Virgin the maidens meet; 

The cactus-hedges crimson to flower. 

The olives silver hour by hour 

As through their branches the south wind steals; 

A clear bell peals, and a vulture wheels 

Over the crest where the wild crags be; — 

Nazareth town in Galilee! 

Nazareth town in Galilee! 

At the sound of the words how memory 

Kindles as earth does under the spring. 

Till the dead days rise for our visioning; 

And out of them one compassionate face 

Beams with a more than mortal grace; 

Out of them one inspiring voice 

Cries in the ears of the world, "Rejoice!** 

And ever a beacon of hope shall be 

Nazareth town in Galilee! 

Nazareth Town 

Clinton Scollard 

54f 



And his mother kept all these sayings 
in her heart. 

Mary sat in the corner dreaming. 

Dim was the room and low. 
While in the dusk the saw went screaming 

To and fro. 

Jesus and Joseph toiled together, 

Mary was watching them. 
Thinking of Kings in the wintry weather 

At Bethlehem. 

Mary sat in the corner thinking, 

Jesus had grown a man; 
One by one her hopes were sinking 

As the years ran. 

Jesus and Joseph toiled together, 

Mary's thoughts were far — 
Angels sang in the wintry weather 

Under a star. 

Mary sat in the corner weeping. 

Bitter and hot her tears — 
Little faith were the angels keeping 

All the years. 

In the Carpenter's Shop 

Sara Teasdalb 

55 



He was in the world, 

avid the world knew him not . . . 

The summer dawn came over-soon. 
The earth was like hot iron at noon 

In Nazareth; 
There fell no rain to ease the heat. 
And dusk drew on with tired feet 

And stifled breath. 

The shop was low and hot and square. 
And fresh-cut wood made sharp the air. 

While all day long 
The saw went tearing through the oak 
That moaned as tho' the tree's heart broke 

Beneath its wrong. 

The narrow street was full of cries. 
Of bickering and snarling Kes 

In many keys — 
The tongues of Egypt and of Rome 
And lands beyond the shifting foam 

Of windy seas. 

Sometimes a ruler riding fast 

Scattered the dark crowds as he passed. 

And drove them close 
In doorways, drawing broken breath 
Lest they be trampled to their death 

Where the dust rose. 

56 



There in the gathering night and noise 
A group of Gahlean boys 

Crowding to see 
Gray Joseph toihng with his son. 
Saw Jesus, when the task was done. 

Turn wearily. 

He passed them by with hurried tread 
Silently, nor raised his head. 

He who looked up 
Drinking all beauty from his birth 
Out of the heaven and the earth 

As from a cup. 

And Mary, who was growing old. 
Knew that the pottage would be cold 

When he returned; 
He hungered only for the night. 
And westward, bending sharp and bright. 

The thin moon burned. 

He reached the open western gate 
Where whining halt and leper wait. 

And came at last 
To the blue desert, where the deep 
Great seas of twilight lay asleep, 

Windless and vast. 

With shining eyes the stars awoke. 

The dew lay heavy on his cloak, 
57 



The world was dim; 
And in the stillness he could hear 
His secret thoughts draw very near 

And call to him. 

Faint voices lifted shrill with pain 
And multitudinous as rain; 

From all the lands 
And all the villages thereof 
Men crying for the gift of love 

With outstretched hands. 

Voices that called with ceaseless crying 
The broken and the blind, the dying. 

And those grown dumb 
Beneath oppression, and he heard 
Upon their lips the single word, 

"Come!" 

Their cries engulfed him like the night. 
The moon put out her placid light 

And black and low 
Nearer the heavy thunder drew. 
Hushing the voices . . . yet he knew 

That he would go. 



A quick-spun thread of lightning bums. 

And for a flash the day returns — 
58 



He only hears 
Joseph, an old man bent and white, 
Toihng along from morn till night 

Through all the years. 

Swift clouds make all the heavens blind, 
A storm is running on the wind — 

He only sees 
How Mary will stretch out her hands 
Sobbing, who never understands 

Voices like these. 

The Carpenter s Son 

Sara Teasdale 



Ill 

THE MINISTRY OF 
JESUS 



Thou art my beloved Son: 
in thee I am well pleased. 

Erect in youthful grace and radiant 

With spirit forces, all imparadised 
In a divine compassion, down the slant 

Of these remembering hills He came, the Christ. 

By the Sea of Galilee 

Katharine Lee Bates 



Lo, the world is gone after him! 

At last the very land whose breath he breathed. 
The very hills his bruised feet did climb! 
This is his Olivet; on this Mount he stood. 
As I do now, and with this same surprise 
Straight down into the startling blue he gazed 
Of the fair, turquoise mid-sea of the plain. 
That long, straight, misty, dream-like, violet wall 
Of Moab — lo, how close it looms! The same 
Quick human wonder struck his holy vision. 
About these feet the flowers he knew so well. 
Back where the city's shadow slowly climbs 
There is a wood of Olives gaunt and gray 
And centuries old; it holds the name it bore 
That night of agony and bloody sweat. 

63 



I tell you when I looked upon these fields 
And stony valleys, — through the purple veil 
Of twilight, or what time the Orient sun 
Made shining jewels of the barren rocks, — 
Something within me trembled; for I said: 
This picture once was mirrored in his eyes; 
This sky, that lake, those hills, this loveliness, 
To him familiar were; this is the way 
To Bethany; the red anemones 
Along yon wandering path mark the steep road 
To green-embowered Jordan. All is his: 
These leprous outcasts pleading piteously; 
This troubled country, — troubled then as now, 
And wild and bloody, — this is his own land. 
On such a day, girdled by these same hills, 
Prest by his dark-browed, sullen. Orient crowd. 
On yonder mount, spotted with crimson blooms. 
He closed his eyes, in that dark tragedy 
Which mortal spirit never dared to sound. 
O God! I saw those eyes in every throng. 

Part of a poem entitled. In Palestine 

Richard Watson Gilder 



Toward the sea, beyond the Jordan^ 
Galilee of the Gentiles. 

Bright 'neath the Syrian sun, dim 'neath the Syrian 

star. 
Thus lieth GaHlee's sea, sapphirine lake Gennesar; 

64 



Girdled by mountains that range purple and proud 

to their crests, 
Bearing the burden of dreams, — glamour of eld, — obl 

their breasts. 

Just one white glint of a sail dotting the brooding 

expanse; 
Beaches that sparkle and gleam, ripples that darkle 

and dance; 

Grandeur and beauty and peace welded year-long int© 

one. 
Under the Syrian star, under the Syrian sun! 

And over all and through all memories sweet of His 

name. 
Kindling the past with their light, touching the future 

with flame! 

Gennesar 

Clinton Scollard 



And straightway the Spirit 

driveth him forth into the wilderness. 

Up from the Jordan straight His way He took 
To that lone wilderness, where rocks are hurled. 
And strewn, and piled, — as if the ancient world 

In strong convulsions seethed and writhed and shook, 

Q5 



Which heaved the valleys up, and sunk each brook, 
And flung the molten rock like ribbons curled 
In mists of gray around the mountains whirled: — 

A grim land, of a fierce, forbidding look. 

The wild beasts haunt its barren stony heights. 
And wilder visions came to tempt Him there; 
For forty days and forty weary nights. 

Alone He faced His mortal self and sin, 
Chaos without, and chaos reigned within, 
Subdued and conquered by the might of prayer. 

The Wilderness 

Caroline Hazard 



And Jesus went about in all Galilee, 
preaching the gospel of the kingdom. 

Should not the glowing lilies of the field 

With keener splendor mark His footprints yet 

— Prints of the gentle feet whose passing healed 
All blight from Tabor unto Olivet? 

In His Steps 
Katharine Lee Bates 



The multitude welcomed him, 
for they were all waiting for him. 

Where the patient oxen were, by the ass's stall. 

Watching my Lord's manger knelt the waking cattle all; 

'Twas a little country maid vigil by Him kept — 

All among the country things my good Lord slept. 

66 



Fair was Rome the city on that early Christmas morn. 
Yet among the country-folk was my Lord born! 

Country-lads that followed Him, blithe they were and 

kind, 
It was only city folk were hard to Him and blind: 
Ay, He told of lilies, and of grain and grass that grew, 
Fair things of the summer fields my good Lord knew. 
By the hedgerows* flowering there He laid His head — 
It was in the country that my Lord was bred. 

When the cross weighed down on Him, on the grievous 

road, 
'Twas a kindly countryman raised my good Lord's load; 
Peasant-girls of Galilee, folk of Nazareth 
These were fain to follow him down the ways of death — 
Yea, beyond a city wall, underneath the sky, 
Out in open country did my good Lord die. 

When He rose to Heaven on that white Ascension day 
Last from open country did my good Lord pass away; 
Rows of golden seraphim watched where He should 

dwell. 
Yet it was the country-folk had my Lord's farewell: 
Out above the flowered hill, from the mossy grass. 
Up from open country did my good Lord pass. 

Where the jewelled minsters are, where the censers 
sway, 

There they kneel to Christ the Lord on this His bearing- 
day: 

67 



But I shall stay to greet Him where the bonny fields 
begin, 

Like the fields that once my good Lord wandered in. 

Where His thorn-tree flowered once, where His spar- 
rows soared. 

In the open country of my good Lord! 

A Country Carol 

Margaret Widdemer 



What think ye of the Christ? 

Comes any good from Nazareth? 

The scornful challenge as of old 
Is flung on many a jeering breath 

From cloistered cells and marts of gold. 

Comes any good from Nazareth? 

Behold, the mighty Nazarene, 
The Lord of life, the Lord of death. 

Through warring ages walks serene. 

One touch upon his garment's fringe 
Still heals the hurt of bitter years. 

Before Him yet the demons cringe. 
He gives the wine of joy for tears. 

O city of the Carpenter, 

Upon the hill slope old and gray. 

The world amid its pain and stir 
Turns yearning eyes on thee to-day. 

68 



For He who dwelt in Nazareth, 

And wrought with toil of hand and brain. 
Alone gives victory to faith 

Until the day He come again. 

From Nazareth 
Margaret E. Sangstee 



He opened his mouth and 
taught them, saying — 

An upland plain, with sandy soil and bare; 

Tall tufts of grass start from the barren ground 
And branching bushes; scattered all around 

Are jagged rocks to form a shelter where 

The foxes still have holes and make their lair; 
While birds of prey up in the still profound 
Of lambent sky are circling o'er the mound 

Twin-crested, basking in the spring-time air. 

It was upon that sun-crowned little hill 
Beneath the Syrian sky the Master spoke 
Such blessed words that they are living still; 

"I have compassion on the multitude;" 
And while He blessed and gave them mortal food 
The everlasting bread for them He broke. 

The Mount of Beatitudes 

Caroline Hazar© 

60 



And he spoke also this parable unto certain 
'mho trusted in themselves that they were righteous. 

Two men went up into God's place to pray, 

The one a Pharisee. He stood apart. 

Evening in flight had dropped immortal flowers 

Of sunset bloom. The quiet city lay 

Like a pale gem beneath a night of stars^ 

And no sound rose. 

Besought the Pharisee, 

Beating his head upon the marble wall, 

"God, God, I thank Thee for this bitterness; 

I thank Thee that, in anguish, I am lift 

Above my fellows, that Thou choosest me 

For throes that rend no other, that Thou givest 

An awful and peculiar agony 

Such as One only bore. I thank Thee, God!'* 

Then as he prayed, he listened to the sobs 

Heaving up from his soul, counted the tears 

That burned upon his face, and held his woe 

Supreme ! 

The other knelt, a Publican, 

In sober dress and common attitude. 

He prayed, "Ah, stern Jehovah, Thou dost take 

My self-belief, my courage and my joy. 

Even mine inmost treasure, secret love! 

I bow to Thy decree. Mayhap Thy sword 

Smites with Hke heaviness this desolate man 

Beside me. We are brothers in despair. 

Am I then isolate before Thy wrath .^^ 
70 



Am I then all alone in agony? 
Behold, Thy pitiless, ironic word 
Brands us alike, the mighty Pharisee 
And the poor bhnded, weeping Publican!" 

The Pharisee 
Dorothy Landers Beali* 



But while he was yet afar off, 

his father saw him, and was moved with compassion. 

Here feast I at my Father's board, 
Who starved among the swine; 

For me must every foot be fleet 
And every lamp must shine; 

For me the merry music sounds. 
The dancers dip and twine. 

My heart beats fast against my robe, 
The best robe, soft and red; 

With sobbing breath and tightening throat 
And tears in rapture shed, 

I feel His ring upon my hand, 
His blessings on my head. 

Ah, bitter was the way, and oft 
My blood my path would trace; 

And guilt and grief and stabbing shame 
With all my steps kept pace; 

And yet I famished not for bread i/^ 

So sore as for His face. 
71 



The road seemed endless. On I fared, 
Wresting each mile from death; 

Then such an awe upon me fell 
I scarce could draw my breath; 

My spirit felt His coming as 
Of one that succoreth. 

Blind, fainting, to His mighty breast 
He caught and held me fast; 

I knew the fortress of His arms 
About my weakness cast; 

And, when He kissed my traitor cheek, 
I guessed His heart at last. 

The piteous words I oft had conned 

I trembling strove to say; 
But sudden glory round me poured 

A brighter, richer day. 
In wonderment I lifted up 

My head that drooping lay. 

The glory streamed from out His eyes, 
As from all Beauty's throne. 

O depths of love unthinkable 
That in that splendor shone! 

O pain of love that travaileth 
And bleedeth for its own! 

O gleam of wisdom hoar with eld 
Ere sang the stars of morn! 

72 



O shifting, blending, dazzling lights, 
That thrilled my hope forlorn 

To undreamed miracles of joy 
And surge of life reborn! 



He brought me home, and here I sit. 

Even in my boyhood's place; 
And on my very soul is stamped 

Each largess of His grace; 
But still transfiguring all I see 

That radiance of His face! 

The Prodigal Son 

Marion Pelton Guild 



Now there was a man of the Pharisees 
named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: 
the' same came to Jesus by night. 

And Nicodemus came by night 
When none might hear or see — 

He came by night to shun men's sight 
And away by night slunk he. 

He dared not come by light of day 

To move where sinners trod: 
He must hold apart from the common heart. 

For he was a Man of God. 

73 



But the honest Christ, He walked with men 

Nor held his ways apart — 
With publicans talked, with harlots walked, 

And loved them all in his heart. ... 

Came Nicodemus to Christ by night; 

And long they reasoned, alone, 
Till the Old Man saw the sham of the Law 

That turned his being to stone: 

He tore the formal husks from his life. 
He was born again, though gray. 

And, erect with the youth of a Living Truth, 
He dared the world by day! 

Nicodemus 

Harry Kemp 



For Mary hath chosen the good fart, 
which shall not he taken away from her. 

Now the Martha of her stiffened to her load, 
Down- weighing, of relentless daily care. 

Now she straightened upright, would not bend nor 
break, 
But held herself all iron standing there. 

When the Mary of her called unto her soul. 

And made a moan, and cried to it in vain: 

"Oh, this woman — look! She fretteth overmuch 

And leaves no space for me; Lord, I complain.'* 
74 



But the Martha of her listened with the sigh 
Of those too weary or too strong to rest: 

"Tell who taketh, then, this burden if I cease, 
And empty both my hands upon my breast." 

Oh, a soul divided is a soul forspent, 
She went still asking: "Is it I? Or I?" 

Low forever through the silence Mary spoke, 
And Martha, sad and sure, did make reply. 

Till the irony and harmony of death 

Made out of these a concord high and sweet. 

When the Martha of the woman, toiling, passed. 
Estranged from ease, she sought her Master's feet. 

"Now my turn has come, my turn at last," she cried, 
"My time to worship, listening to Thy word.'* 

Ah, but calm beyond her, fair above her still. 
The Mary of her knelt before the Lord. 

The Twain of Her 
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward 



Foxes have holes and birds have nests, 
but the Son of Man hath not where to 
lay fUs head. 

No longer of Him be it said, 

"He hath no place to lay His head." 

In every land a constant lamp 
Flames by His small and mighty camp. 

75 



There is no strange and distant place 
That is not gladdened by His face. 

And every nation kneels to hail 
, The Splendor shining through its veil. 

Cloistered beside the shouting street. 
Silent, He calls me to His feet. 

Imprisoned for His love of me 
He makes my spirit greatly free. 

And through my lips that uttered sin 
The King of Glory enters in. 

Citizen of the World 

Joyce Kilmer 

And lifting up their eyes, 

they saw no one, save Jesus only. 

If Death should visit me to-night 
And bid me forth unto the skies 
I pray Thee, Christ, to let me see 
No jasper paradise. 

But Thee, in fields of asphodel, 
Familiar as my earth-eyes knew. 
With face uplift and radiant, 
The Christ that Raphael drew. 

The Christ of RaphaeVs Transfiguration 

Mary Bowen Bbainerb 

76 



Raise the stone, and there thou shalt find Me ; 
cleave the wood, and there am I. Logion V. 

Hear the word that Jesus spake 
Eighteen centuries ago. 
Where the crimson HHes blow 
Round the blue Tiberian lake: 
There the bread of life he brake. 

Through the fields of harvest walking 
With His lowly comrades, talking 
Of the secret thoughts that feed 
Weary hearts in time of need. 
Art thou hungry? Come and take; 
Hear the word that Jesus spake: 
'Tis the sacrament of labour; meat and drink divinely 

blest; 
Friendship's food, and sweet refreshment; strength 
and courage, joy and rest. 

Yet this word the Master said, 

Long ago and far away. 

Silent and forgotten lay 
Buried with the silent dead, — 
Where the sands of Egypt spread, 

Sea-like, tawny billows heaping 

Over ancient cities sleeping; 
While the River Nile between 
Rolls its summer flood of green. 

Rolls its autumn flood of red, — 

There the word the Master said 

77 



Written on a frail papyrus, scorched by fire, wrinkled, 

torn. 
Hidden in God's hand, was waiting for its resurrection 

morn. 

Hear the Master's risen word! 
Delving spades have set it free, — 
Wake! the world has need of thee, — 
Rise, and let thy voice be heard. 
Like a fountain disinterred. 

Upward springing, singing, sparkling; 
Through the doubtful shadows darkling; 
Till the clouds of pain and rage 
Brooding o'er the toiling age, 
As with rifts of light are stirred 
By the music of the word; 
Gospel for the heavy-laden, answer to the labourer's 

cry; 
"Raise the stone, and thou shalt find me; cleave the 
wood, and there am I." 

A Lost Word of Jesus 

Henry van Dyke 



Come unto Me and I will give you rest. 

We labor and are heavy-laden. Where 

Shall we find rest unto our souls.? We bleed 
On thorn and flint, and rove in pilgrim weed 
From shrine to shrine, but comfort is not there. 

78 



What went we out into thy desert bare, 
O Human Life, to see? Thy greenest reed 
Is Love, unmighty for our utmost need. 
And shaken with the wind of our despair. 

A voice from Heaven like dew on Hermon falleth. 
That voice whose passion paled the olive leaf 
In thy dusky aisles, Gethsemane, thou blest 

Of gardens. 'Tis the Man of Sorrows calleth. 
The Man of Sorrows and acquaint with grief: 
"Come unto Me, and I will give you rest.'* 

Come Unto Me 

Katharine Lee Bates 



For fower came from him, 
and healed them all. 

"Some one has touched me, — touched my garment 

hem; 

For I perceive that power hath issued hence." 

There stayed the Christ midway, and journeyed 

thence 

To her just dropped from Jairus' diadem, — 

A virgin shining pure, worth living, gem 

Of Israel. Can Jesus recompense.'' 

He may? Who stopped him? Dared such give 

offense? 

'Twas one impure, — and cured! He answers them: 

"Power hath gone out from me." O, thus began, 

And thus continued. His atonement true. 
79 



Drop after drop. His anguished heart gave man 
The Hfe that saves, till death o'er-anxious grew 

To meet Him face to face, with helFs dire clan. 
Then Christ gave all, and sin and death o'erthreir. 

The Cost of Saving 

Frank W. Gunsaulus 

Consider the lilies 
of the field I 

Thy loveliness is meek and free 

From arrogance, and yet I find 
A certain stately pride in thee 

That wakens reverie in my mind 

And well I ween why it is so! — 

A lily once the Master took 
His lesson from, then let it go. 

But first He blessed it with a look. 

Ah! who can doubt the flower was thrilled 
With tremblings strange and raised its head 

With joy, its lovesome body filled 
With sense of what the Master said? 

And lilies since, forevermore. 

Do hold them high, do bear them well. 

Do raise their cups more proudly, for 
The lily of the parable. 

The Lily 
Richard Burton 

80 



Come ye apart into a desert place 
and rest a while. 

A pale light streaming through the rainy sky 

Like peace through sorrow, comforting the eye 

On our Palm Sunday, wayworn pilgrims three, 

Beside the lonely lake of Galilee 

— Most blest of lakes, whose hush remembers yet 

Those multitudes on broad Gennesaret, 

The reaching arms, the cries that still pursued, 

As Jesus sought the mid-sea solitude. 

How oft Mount Hermon, in the sunset glow. 
Would cleave its clouds, exceeding white as snow. 
An alabaster altar crowned with fire. 
To worship Him, the blind world's long Desire, 
The Christ, a guest in some rude fishing-boat, 
Wrapt in His seamless Galilean coat. 
Forspent with healing, drawing heavy breath. 
The Lord of Life Who went the way of death. 

And He, on whom our mortal weakness weighed, 
— Even on Him, Whom winds and waves obeyed,- 
Would peradventure watch, too tired for prayer, 
That sudden splendor melt in purple air. 
As dusk drew over and the stars shone out. 
Until the murmurous ripples, that about 
The rocking keel intoned their timid psalms. 
Were to His slumber like the sound of palms. 

If then stepped soft the sons of Zebedee 
To ease the drooping head on patient knee 

81 



Or coil of net for pillow, surely they 

Marvelled above the Dreamer, for He lay 

With tender triumph on the wistful face. 

As of one welcomed by the waving grace 

Of fair green branches, while their hearts in them 

Burned with impatience for Jerusalem. 

Palm Sunday in Galilee 

Katharine Lee Bates 



Why are ye fearful ? 
Have ye not yet faith ? 

What shall we do when the great tides knock 
And remorseless enter though walls be rock? 
When the strong waves dash and the surges roll 
And Creation's forces overwhelm the soul? 
Christ! oh Christ! once again say "Peace!" 
Yet once again bid the tempest cease! 

What shall we do when the tides go back, 
When the dull sky hangs over weed and wrack, 
When there's nothing left for the dreary strand 
But a foam-spread waste and a sea- wet sand? 
Once again, oh Christ! build Thy little fire; 
Feed and comfort us, Heart's Desire! 

Consolator 
Maria Elmendorf Lillie 

82 



Put out into the deep 

and let down your nets for a draught. 

Yea, we have toiled all night. All night 
We kept the boats, we cast the nets. 

Nothing avails: the tides withhold, 
The Sea hears not, and God forgets. 

Long ere the sunset, we took leave 

Of them at home whom want doth keep; 

Now bitterness be all their bread 

And tears their drink, and death their sleep! 

The gaunt moon stayed to look on us 

And marvel we abode so still. 
Again we east, again we drew 

The nets that naught but hope did fill. 

And while the grasp of near Despair 
Did threaten nearer with the day. 

Leagues out, the bounteous silver-sides 

Leaped through the sheltering waves, at play! 

So, stricken with the cold that smites 
Death to a dying heart at morn. 

We waited, thralls to hunger, such 

As the strong stars may laugh to scorn. 

And while we strove, leagues out, afar. 
Returning tides, — with mighty hands 

Full of the silver! — passed us by 
To cast it upon alien lands. 

83 



Against the surge of hope we stood 
And the waves laughed with victory; 

Yet at our heart-strings, with the nets, 
Tugged the false promise of the sea. 



So all the night-time we kept watch; 

And when the years of night were done. 
Aflame with hunger, stared on us 

The fixed red eye of yonder sun. 



Thou Wanderer from land to land, 
Say who Thou art that bids us strive 

Once more against the eternal Sea 
That loves to take strong men alive. 

Lo, we stood fast, and we endure: 

But trust not Thou the Sea we know. 

Mighty of bounty and of hate, 

Slayer and friend, with ebb and flow. 



Thou hast not measured strength as we 
Sea-faring men that toil. And yet — 

Once more, once more — at Thy strange word, 
Master, we will let down the net! 

The Fishers 
Josephine Preston Peabody 

84 



And he came forth and saw a great multitude, 
and he had compassion on them. 

When the golden evening gathered on the shore of Galilee, 
When the fishing boats lay quiet by the sea, 

vLong ago the people wondered, tho' no sign was in 
the sky, 

[For the glory of the Lord was passing by. 

[Not in robes of purple splendor, not in silken softness 

shod, 
But in raiment worn with travel came their God, 
And the people knew His presence by the heart that 

ceased to sigh 
When the glory of the Lord was passing by. 

For He healed their sick at even, and He cured the 

leper's sore. 
And sinful men and women sinned no more. 
And the world grew mirthful-hearted, and forgot its 

misery 
When the glory of the Lord was passing by. 

Not in robes of purple splendor, but in lives that do 

His will. 
In patient acts of kindness He comes still; 
And the people cry with wonder, tho' no sign is in 

the sky, 
i^That the glory of the Lord is passing by. 

How He Came 

W. J. Dawson 
85 



To-day is salvation come to this house. 

For the Son of man came to seek and to save 

Uiat which was lost. 

This plain made bright with streaks of crimson clay 
And sprinkled o'er with grains of golden sand — 
The vestige of a long-forgotten strand — 

Once saw the host of Israel as it lay 

With pikes and trumpets in war's fierce array. 
Now in the grass the solemn wild storks stand, 
A pensive silence broods upon the land, 

Unbroken by the shout which won that day. 

Zaccheus lived here, who desired to see 

When Christ came down the Jordan wilderness; 

And one born blind cried out exceedingly. 
I too am blind, my Lord; oh, give me sight! 

Illume my mind. Thou very Light of Light! 

I cannot let Thee go until Thou bless. 

Jericho 

Caroline Hazabo 



Se fold me all things that ever I did. 

Too well I know what the voices mean — 

The tale of the mart, the cry of the street. 

The whispered word and the grin unclean 

That follow my weary-moving feet — 
86 



I am what they will not forget 

Who kept their girlhood clean and free — 

A woman of the street, and yet, 

The Christ's own hand fell soft on me. 

Bitter it is to feel and know 
I love the life I now must lead — 
The thrilling glare, the flaunting show. 
The painted craft, the shallow greed; 
Yes, I could find it in my power 
To laugh and burn my life away. 
But that there comes a little hour 
Between the fevered night and day. 

In the chill dawn, perhaps, or blown 
Down the still pave, when one by one 
The beacon street-lamps wink alone, 
The day's work ended, mine begun — 
Then like a knell of death I hear 
"Thou art forgiv'n: go, sin no more!" 
But whither can I take my fear. 
And who will bide the leper's sore? 

A Woman of Samaria 

Douglas Dues 

Go, and sin no more. 

Master, what work hast thou for me, — 
For me, who turn aside in shame 
Before the eyes of my own blame? 
Thou seest, Lord. 

87 



I see. 
That shame for Me thou shalt endure. 
That thou mayst succour souls afraid. 
Who would not dare to seek for aid 
The mercilessly pure. 

But must my heart forever show 
These scars of unforgotten pain? 
May it be never whole again? 
Thou knowest. Lord. 

I know. 
Those scars I leave thee for a sign 
That bleeding hearts may creep to rest 
As on a mother's sheltering breast 
On that scarred heart of thine. 

Magdalen to Christ 

Amelia Josephine Burr 



And I give unto them eternal life; 
and they shall never -perish, 

Lazarus tells the people that crowd about him why he 
came back from the land of the dead. 

Lazariis — 

Who has seen Heaven 
May pass no speech upon it. I grow dumb 
And helpless thinking of it, with no words 
But for one only thing, and that the best. 
Since that it lured me out of perfect bliss 

And Heaven was not strong to keep me from it. 

88 



i 



The crowd — 
The Christ! The Christ! 

A man — 

I think it was His face 
That shone upon thee. If I were dispersed 
Into the various ways of sun and dew, 
A portion of the slow mood of the soil 
And sweet thought of the air, I would return 
And, reaching helpless hands out of the dust. 
Gathering dimly out of stone and rain. 
Would rear myself before Him if His face 
But shone upon the world where I abode. 

Lazarus — 
Nay, not the love and solace of His face. 

A woman — 

What drew thee, then? The way were cold to come 
With no dear smile to lure. What better thing 
Bade thee from Paradise.^ 

A man — 

It was His voice! 
Ay! Were I feasting with the happy dead 
And shouting with great laughter, I would rise. 
Forgetting love and cheer for ways forlorn 
So that His voice called. 

Lazarus — 

Nay — not His voice. 

89 



A woman — 

Thou earnest all alone? What swayed thee, then, 
To seek our sorrow from the blessed dead? 

Lazarus — 

A great desire led me out alone 

From those assured abodes of perfect bliss. 

One thing more fair than they, more keen, more 

sweet ! 
And I was swayed before it helplessly. 
For the desire of it; and I rose. 
And stepped from those slow aeons of delight 
And by the way I went came seeking earth, 
Seeing before my eyes one only thing — 

The crowd — 

What was it, Lazarus? Let us share that thing. 
What was it, brother, thou didst see? 

Lazarus — 

A cross. 

Passage from Lazarus 
Anna Hempstead Branch 



IV 

THE GREAT WEEK IN 
JESUS' LIFE 



My house shall be called a house of prayer 
jar all the nations. 

On the day that Christ ascended 

To Jerusalem, 
Singing multitudes attended. 
And the very heavens were rended 

With the shout of them. 

Chanted they a sacred ditty. 

Every heart elate; 
But he wept in brooding pity. 
Then went in the holy city 

By the Golden Gate. 

In the temple, lo! what lightning 

Makes unseemly rout' 
He in anger, sudden, frightening. 
Drives with scorn and scourge the whitening 

Money-changers out. 

By the way that Christ descended 

From Mount Olivet, 

I, a lonely pilgrim, wended. 

On the day his entry splendid 

Is remembered yet. 
93 



And I thought: If he, returning 

On this high festival. 
Here should haste with love and yearning. 
Where would now his fearful, burning 

Anger flash and fall? 

In the very house they builded 

To his saving name, 
'Mid their altars, gemmed and gilded. 
Would his scourge and scorn be wielded. 

His fierce lightning flame? 

Once again, O Man of Wonder, 

Let thy voice be heard! 
Speak as with a sound of thunder; 
Drive the false thy roof from under. 

Teach thy priests thy word. 

The Anger of Christ 
Richard Watson Gilder 



But ye have made it a den of robbers. 

That day the doves with burnished breasts 
Uneasy were; we, halt and blind and lame, 

Within the temple waited, ugly guests. 

Hoping, in spite of filth, disease and shame; 

Outside the multitude waved branches green. 

Calling, "Hosanna to the Nazarene." 

94 



I shrank close to the roof -prop, for my eyes 
Were dead to seeing: but I heard the clink of 
coins, 
The piles of silver shekels steadily rise. 
Poured from sheiks' bags and belts 'round merchant 
loins; 
I heard the purple priced; and in between 
Far off, — "Hosanna to the Nazarene." 

I could not see Him enter, but I heard 
The multitude and smelled the dusty throng: 

Old Anab brushed me with his ragged beard. 

Muttering, "Kneel, thou! He will speak ere long." 

Yea — though five times more leprous I had been 

I would come here to implore the Nazarene. 

But then the woman Terah, ill of pox, 

Began to whimper. "See, he bringeth woe! 

He overturns the booths, the treasure-box; 

His eyes blaze on the dove-sellers. Let us go! 

He'll scourge us, smite us. Tush! It is well seen 

We shall be cursed of the Nazarene." 



A form swept past us, we in terror caught 
A man's clear voice of anger: then the sound 

Of fleeing feet of traflSckers, onslaught 

On booths, and tables crashing to the ground. 

I heard the money scatter and careen 

Under the spurning of the Nazarene. 

95 



Rachel, a maiden, clutched my sleeve, and shrank 
With me behind the curtain, and the crowd 

Surged wildly past. For us, our dear hopes sank 
Under that stern voice cutting like a goad. 

Judging, arraigning, charging; 'mid the spleen 

Of money-changers, stood the Nazarene! 

"This temple is my house, the House of Prayer!^* 
(His voice was like the wind that whips the leaves) 

"But with your huyings and your sellings there 
Ye — ye have made my house a den of thieves^ 

Then little R-achel sobbed; "Awful his mien; 

His eyes are flames; I fear the Nazarene." 

But when the temple silenced — ^while a dove 
Fluttered and soared and beat against the roof. 

We frightened beggars heard a voice of love 
Calling us gently; then his tender proof 

He gave. He healed us! I, who had been 

Blind from my birth — I saw the Nazarene! 

Told in the Market-place 

Edwina Stanton Babcock 



Blessed is the king that cometk 
in the name of the Lord. 

The street stands crowded from wall to wall. 

Yon Hebrew boy, come here, I pray. 

And tell me what has sufficed to call 

Such multitude abroad to-day. 
96 



"Friend, do you see upon yonder hill 

Where the road winds around old Olive's brow?" 

*'Lad, I see only the sunshine still, 

And some ragged trees and the dust below; 

"While along the poor path some weary men. 

With one in their midst as poor as they; 

He is much bespent, for I see again, 

That he rides on an ass; and they draw this way." 

"Stranger, many a month before, 

I stood on the coast of Gennesaret's sea; 

In a basket of wicker some loaves I bore 

That my mother, at home, had prepared for me. 

"Stranger, just at the set of the sun. 

He that was teaching called me anear; 

*Will you give me your loaves, lad?' * Every one!' 

I answered, and gave them with never a fear. 

"Stranger, five thousand men and more 
Had heard what the teacher had to say; 
And these were hungry; He blessed my store. 
And He fed them all, and He sent them away. 

"Stranger, He that rides down toward the gate 
Is that Teacher — All Hail! Let me go, I say. 
I must join them at once. I would not be late. 
You must keep me no longer, — I cannot stay." 

97 



"Hosanna!" down from the hill they cry, 
"Hosanna!" comes back from the town below. 
As they pay meet homage and honor high. 
And for Christ's dear feet their green palms strow. 

Part of a poem called Palm Sunday 

Carroll Lund Bates 



When he drew nigh, he saw the city, 
and wept over it. 

The long ascent was ended, evening shed 

Its softest light, and from Mount Olive's brow 
The holy city stood before Him; how 

Fair, with temple crowned and garlanded 

With massive walls. The sacrifice is led 
Not only in the days of Abraham's vow 
To Mount Moriah, but comes here and now 

Upon the ass's colt with garments spread. 

"Jerusalem," the tender voice laments, 

"That stonest those that come to thy release. 
The slaughter of the holy innocents. 

The blood of martyrs make thy diadem; 
If thou hadst known, e'en thou, Jerusalem, 
The precious things belonging to thy peace!" 

The Lament 

Caroline Hazard 
98 



Jerusalem, Jerusalem, 
that Jcilletk the -prophets! 

Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who oft 

His love had gathered thee beneath its wings 
And thou wouldst not! — Love crucified aloft 

On Calvary, enthroned the King of Kings. 

At Jerusalem 
Katharine Lee Bates 



Are ye able to drink the cup 
that I am about to drink f 

At last the bird that sung so long 
In twilight circles, hushed his song; 
Above the ancient square 
The stars came here and there. 

Good Friday Night! Some hearts were bowed. 
But some amid the waiting crowd 
Because of too much youth 
Felt not the mystic ruth; 

And of these hearts my heart was one: 
Nor when beneath the arch of stone 
With dirge and candle flame 
The cross of passion came, 

Did my glad spirit feel reproof. 

Though on the awful tree aloof, 
99 



Unspiritual, dead, 

Drooped the ensanguined Head. 

To one who stood where myrtles made 
A little space of deeper shade 
(As I could half descry, 
A stranger, even as I), 

I said, "Those youths who bear along 
The symbols of their Saviour's wrong. 
The spear, the garment torn. 
The flaggel, and the thorn, — 

"Why do they make this mummery? 
Would not a brave man gladly die 
For a much smaller thing 
Than to be Christ and king?" 

He answered nothing, and I turned. 
Throned in its hundred candles burned 
The jewelled eidolon 
Of her who bore the Son, 

The crowd was prostrate; still, I felt 
No shame until the stranger knelt; 
Then not to kneel, almost 
Seemed like a vulgar boast. 

I knelt. The doll-face, waxen white. 

Flowered out a living dimness; bright 

Dawned the dear mortal grace 

Of my own mother's face. 
100 



When we were risen up, the street 
Was vacant; all the air hung sweet 
With lemon-flowers; and soon 
The sky would hold the moon. 

More silently than new-found friends 
To whom much silence makes amends 
For the much babble vain 
While yet their lives were twain, 

We walked along the odorous hill. 
The light was little yet; his will 
I could not see to trace 
Upon his form or face. 

So when aloft the gold moon broke, 
I cried, heart-stung. As one who woke 
He turned unto my cries 
The anguish of his eyes. 

"Friend! Master!" I cried falteringly, 
"Thou seest the thing they make of Thee. 
Oh, by the light divine. 
My mother shares with thine, 

"I beg that I may lay my head 
Upon thy shoulder and be fed 
With thoughts of brotherhood!" 
So through the odorous wood, 

101 



More silently than friends new-found 
We walked. At the first meadow bound 
His figure ashen-stoled 
Sank in the moon's broad gold. 

Good Friday Night 

William Vaughn Moody 



Having loved his own which toere in the 
worldt he loved them unto the end. 

John, my beloved, come with me apart 
In this dim garden for a little space. 
I cannot rest me though the others sleep; 
There is a time to wake them, but not now. 

Is it not good to climb this hill to-night 

After the glad hozannas in the street. 

The crowding faces, life and men and love. 

Here on the slope of the eternal stars 

To watch the lights that shine through Kedron's vale. 

And 'neath the olives walk alone with God ? 

'Tis not the first time that we two have walked 
Shoulder to shoulder underneath the stars; 
Nor yet the last, John, though to-morrow's sun 
Should dawn upon you, and on you alone. 

Nay, my good brother, loose your fingers' grip. 
You could not keep me if I willed to go: 

102 



Your heart enfolds me, not your fearful arm — 
The lights shine clearer through the dusky vale. 
And with their coming, John, we say goodbye. 

We say goodbye, for every road must end. 
All pleasant journeys underneath the sun; 
Claspt hands are severed, hungry lips must part, 
The long night comes at close of every day. 
And men must slumber when their work is done. 

Nay, it is better, — light is not light alone; 

Were there no shadows, even suns were blind; 

Only by parting do men meet again. 

And we have met, John, met in a holy land 

Alone with God in his great silences 

Where never men have ventured — ^you and I. 

And we have looked upon the gates of heaven. 

Beyond the stars, beyond the flaming sun. 

Beyond all time, and known that God is love. 

Was it not worth it, just to dare to be 
One's simple self, to think, to love, to do. 
And not to be ashamed? To live one's life 
Fearless and pure and strong, true to one's self. 
Though the false world were full of lies and hate, 
Where blind men lead each other through the dark. 
Too weak to sin, ashamed of what is good, 
Unable to do evil, thinking it. 

But tve have dared. David and Jonathan 
Drank no divinelier in courts of Saul 
Than we together in Gethsemane. 

103 



And though to-night I drain the cup of death 
Down to the stinging dregs of Judas' kiss. 
The wine of love Hes sweeter on my hps — 
I see the lanterns gleaming. Kiss me, John. 

John 
WiLLARD Wattles 



Me went forth with his disciples over the brook Kidron^ 
where was a garden. 

Into the woods my Master went. 

Clean forspent, forspent. 

Into the woods my Master came. 

Forspent with love a.nd shame. 

But the olives they were not blind to Him, 

The little gray leaves were kind to Him, 

The thorn-tree had a mind to Him, 

When into the woods He came. 

Out of the woods my Master went. 

And He was well content. 

Out of the woods my Master came. 

Content with love and shame. 

When Death and Shame would woo Him last. 

From under the trees they drew Him last: 

'Twas on a tree they slew Him — last 

When out of the woods He came, 

A Ballad of Trees and the Master 

Sidney Lanier 

10-1 



My soul is exceeding sorrowful 

even unto death; 

mbide ye here, and watch. 

There is a sighing in the paUid sprays 
Of these old ohves, as if still they kept 

Their pitying watch, in Nature's faithful ways. 
As on that night when the disciples slept. 

At Gethsemane 

E1A.THARINE LeE BaTES 



What then shall I do unto Jesus 
who is called the Christ? 

Have thou naught to do with Him, O Pilate, 
With that Just One! For to-night a dream 
Or an angel spoke: most dread revealing 
Did the vision seem! 

Throned amid the clouds of heaven I see Him; 

See the lightnings flashing from His brow; 
And that Face! — *tis His, the Galilean's, 
Thou art judging now. 

Oh, the clouds of splendor! they enfold Him: 

How the angels throng; their faces shine; 
Oh, His eyes! with calmness, deep, majestic, 
Looking into mine: — 

105 



But I shrink away, — I cannot bear it, 

All that glory. Heaven is bending down. 
And the thorn-pierced, mighty brow, refulgent, 
Wears a victor's crown. 

Earth, all hushed, is waiting to adore Him, 
Mighty seas are murmuring at His feet; 
Mountain heights, in silence, grand, before Him 
Stand, their King to greet. 

See, the nations gather; He hath called them, — 

His, the mighty fiat they obey; 
His, the Man enthroned amid the angels 
On that awful day. 

Darest thou meet Him, in the hour of judgment? 

Pilate, — canst thou answer to His call? 
TrembUng I behold thee; palhd terror 
Holdeth thee in thrall: 

Dumb, convicted, thou wouldst sue for mercy, 
Yet canst find no plea, can speak no word: 
Who is this? — the Judge, whose silence smiteth 
Like avenging sword? 

Fades the dream, as dawn dispels the midnight; 

Last to vanish is that Face sublime; 
And His eyes, still searching mine, command me 
Speak, while yet there's time. 

106 



Oh, refuse not! Pilate, heed the vision, — 

All my soul in anguish bids thee hear; 
Oh, condemn thou not this Man, the Just One; 
For I fear, 7 fear! 

The Dream of Claudia Procula 

Martha Elvira Pettus 



Th9 unsearchable riches of Christ. 

My Master was so very poor, 
A manger was His cradling place; 
So very rich my Master was 
Kings came from far 
To gain His grace. 

My Master was so very poor 

And with the poor He broke the bread; 

So very rich my Master was 

That multitudes 

By him were fed. 

My Master was so very poor 
They nailed Him naked to a cross; 
So very rich my Master was 
He gave His all 
And knew no loss. 



My Master 

Harry Lee 



107 



Pilate delivered Jesus, when 
he had secured him, to be 
crucified. 

I saw in Siena pictures. 

Wandering wearily; 
I sought not the names of the masters 

Nor the works men care to see; 
But once in a low-ceiled passage 

I came on a place of gloom. 
Lit here and there with halos 

Like saints within the room. 
The pure, serene, mild colors 

The early artists used 
Had made my heart grow softer. 

And still on peace I mused. 
Sudden I saw the Sufferer, 

And my frame was clenched with pain; 
Perchance no throe so noble 

Visits my soul again. 
Mine were the stripes of the scourging; 

On my thorn-pierced brow blood ran; 
In my breast the deep compassion 

Breaking the heart for man. 
I drooped with heavy eyelids, 

Till evil should have its will; 
On my lips was silence gathered; 

My waiting soul stood still. 
I gazed, nor knew I was gazing; 

I trembled, and woke to know 
Him whom they worship in heaven 

Still walking on earth below. 

108 



Once have I borne his sorrows 

Beneath the flail of fate! 
Once, in the woe of his passion, 

I felt the soul grow great! 
I turned from my dead Leader; 

I passed the silent door; 
The gray- walled street received me; 

On peace I mused no more. 



Christ Scourged 
George Edward Woodberry 



And they crucify him. 



Friendless and faint, with martyred steps and slow. 

Faint for the flesh, but iox the spirit free. 

Stung by the mob that came to see the show. 

The Master toiled along to Calvary; 

We gibed him, as he went, with houndish glee. 

Till his dim eyes for us did overflow; 

We cursed his vengeless hands thrice wretchedly, — < 

And this was nineteen hundred years ago. 

But after nineteen hundred years the shame 
Still clings, and we have not made good the loss 
That outraged faith has entered in his name. 
Ah, when shall come love's courage to be strong! 
Tell me, O Lord — tell me, O Lord, how long 
Are we to keep Christ writhing on the cross! 

Calvary 
Edwin Arlington Robinson 

109 



/ glorified thee on earthy having accomplished 
the work which thou hast given me to do. 

From Bethlehem to Calvary, the Saviour's journey 

lay; 
Doubt, unbelief, scorn, fear and hate beset Him day 

by day. 
But in His heart He bore God's love that brightened 

all the way. 

O'er the Judean hills He walked, serene and brave of 

soul. 
Seeking the beaten paths of men, touching and making 

whole. 
Dying at last for love of man, on Calvary's darkened 

knoll. 

He went with patient steps and slow, as one who scat- 
ters seed; 

Like a fierce hunger in His heart. He felt the world's 
great need. 

And the negations Moses gave He changed to loving 
deed. 

From Bethlehem to Calvary the world still follows on. 
Even as the halt and blind of old along His path were 

drawn; 
Through Calvary's clouds they seek the light that led 

Him to the dawn. 

From Bethlehem to Calvary 

Meredith Nicholsow 
110 



Truly this man was the Son of God, 

After the shameful trial in the hall. 
The mocking and the scom-ging, and the pain 
Of Peter's words; to Herod, and again 

To Pilate's judgment-seat, the royal pall. 

The cross itself, the vinegar and gall; 

The thieves close by, discipleship proved vain. 
The scoflSng crowd, His mother's tears like rain. 

There came one moment, bitterest of all. 

Yet in that cry, when flesh and spirit failed, 
Last effort of the awful way He trod. 
Which shook the earth, nor left the temple veiled. 

In that exceeding great and bitter cry 

Was conquest. The centurion standing by 
Said, Truly this man was the Son of God. 

The Ninth Hour 

Caroline Hazard 



And when Peter thought thereon, he wept. 

Peter and James and John, 
The sad tale runneth on — 
All slept 9,nd Thee forgot; 
One said he knew Thee not. 

Peter and James and John, 

The sad tale runneth on — 

I am that one, the three; 

Thus have I done to Thee. 
Ill 



Under a garden wall, 

I lay at evenfall; 

I waked. Thou calledst me; 

I had not watched with Thee. 

Peter and James and John, 
The sad tale runneth on — 
By the priest's fagot hot, 
I said I knew Thee not. 

The little maid spake out: 
"With Him thou wentest about." 
"This Man I never met—" 
I hear the cock crow yet. 

Good Friday 

LiZETTE WOODWORTH B-EESE 



And with him they crucify two robbers, 
one on his right hand, and one on his left. 

Three crosses rose on Calvary against the iron sky. 
Each with its living burden, each with its human cry. 
And all the ages watched there, and there were you 
and I. 

One bore the God incarnate, reviled by man's disdain. 

Who through the woe he suffered for our eternal gain, 

, With joy of inj&nite loving assuaged his infinite pain. 

112 



On one the thief repentant conquered his cruel doom, 
Who called at last on Christ and saw his glory through 

the gloom. 
For him after the torment souls of the blest made room. 

And one the unrepentant bore, who his harsh fate defied. 
To him, the child of darkness, all mercy was denied; 
Nailed by his brothers on the cross, he cursed his God 
and died. 

Ah, Christ, who met in Paradise him who had eyes 

to see. 
Didst thou not greet the other in hell's black agony? 
And if he knew thy face. Lord, what did he say to 
thee? 

The Thief on the Cross 

Harriet Monroe 



And the glory which thou hast given me 

I have given unto them; that they may be one, 

even as we are one. \ 

Thanks to Saint Matthew, who had been 
At mass-meetings in Palestine, 
We know whose side was spoken for 
When Comrade Jesus had the floor. 

"Where sore they toil and hard they lie. 

Among the great unwashed dwell I; — 

The tramp, the convict, I am he; 

Cold-shoulder him, cold-shoulder me." 
113 



By Dives' door, with thoughtful eye. 
He did to-morrow prophesy; — 
"The kingdom's gate is low and small; 
The rich can scarce wedge through at all." 

"A dangerous man," said Caiaphas; 
"An ignorant demagogue, alas! 
Friend of low women, it is he 
Slanders the upright Pharisee." 

For law and order, it was plain. 
For Holy Church, he must be slain. 
The troops were there to awe the crowd. 
And violence was not allowed. 

Their clumsy force with force to foil 
His strong, clean hands he would not soil. 
He saw their childishness quite plain 
Between the lightnings of his pain. 

Between the twilights of his end. 
He made his fellow-felon friend; 
With swollen tongue and blinding eyes. 
Invited him to Paradise. 

Ah, let no local him refuse! 
Comrade Jesus hath paid his dues. 
Whatever other be debarred, 
Comrade Jesus hath his red card. 

Comrade Jesus 
' Sara N. Cleghorx 

114 



Verily I say unto you, 

that one of you shall betray me. 

Mary, the Christ long slain, passed silently. 
Following the children joyously astir 
Under the cedrus and the olive-tree. 
Pausing to let their laughter float to her. 
Each voice an echo of a voice more dear, 
She saw a little Christ in every face; 
When lo, another woman, gliding near. 
Yearned o'er the tender life that filled the place. 
And Mary sought the woman's hand and spoke: 
"I know thee not, yet know thy memory tossed 
With all a thousand dreams their eyes evoke 
Who bring to thee a child beloved and lost. 



"I, too, have rocked my little one. 

O He was fair! 

Yea, fairer than the fairest sun. 

And like its rays through amber spun 

His sun-bright hair. 

Still I can see it shine and shine." 

"Even so," the woman said, "was mine. 



» 



"His ways were ever darling ways," — 

And Mary smiled, — 

"So soft, so clinging! Glad relays 

Of love were all His precious days. 

My little child! 

My infinite star! my music fled!" 

"Even so was mine," the woman said. 

115 



Then whispered Mary: "Tell me, thou, 

Of thine." And she: 

"O mine was rosy as a bough 

Blooming with roses, sent, somehow, 

To bloom for me! 

His balmy fingers left a thrill 

Within my breast that warms me still." 

Then gazed she down some wilder, darker hour. 
And said, when Mary questioned, knowing not: 
"Who art thou, mother of so sweet a flower?" 
"I am the mother of Iscariot." 

Motherhood 

Agnes Lee 



And the iDomen, who had come with him 
out of Galilee, followed after, 
and beheld the tomb. 

There was a trampling of horses from Calvary 
Where the armed Romans rode from the mountain 
side; 

Yet riding they dreamed of the soul that could ride free 
Out of the bruised breast and the arms nailed wide. 

There was a trampling of horses from Calvary, 
And the long spears glittered in the night; 

Yet riding they dreamed of the will that dared to be. 

When the head fell and the heavens were rent with 

light. 

116 



The eyes that closed over sleep like folded wings 
And the sad mouth that kissed death with the cry 

"Father, forgive them," — silently these things, 
They remembered, riding down from Calvary. 

And Joseph, when the sick body was lowered slowly, 
Folded it in a white cloth without seam. 

The indomitable brow, inflexible and holy, 

And the sad breast that held the immortal dream. 

And the feet that could not walk, and the pierced 
hand. 
And the arms that held the whole world in their 
embrace ; 
But Mary, beside the cross-tree, could not under- 
stand, 
Looking upon the tired, human face. 

The Mother 
John Hall Wheelock 



Henceforth all generations 
shall call me blessed. 

Mary smiled on her little Son, 

"Now, why hast Thou left Thy play?" 

"But to touch thy hands with my hands, Mother, 
Lest sometime there comes a day 

When I may not close them within my own. 
Though they fall as hurt doves may." 

117 



Mary smiled on her little Son, 

"Now blind wouldst Thou have me go 

That mine eyes Thou hast closed with kisses twain?" 
"My Mother, I may not know. 

But I fear a day when they look on pain 
And I may not close them so." 

Mary smiled on her little Son, 

Close, close in her arms pressed He; 
"O Mother, my Mother, my heart on thine 

Lest sometime a day may be 
When I may not comfort or make it whole. 

Though it break for love of me." 

Now think you that on Calvary hill 

Whereon her Son was slain 
She felt upon her eyes that touch 

That veiled them unto pain^ 
And filled her groping hands ^ and bade 

Her torn heart beat again? 

The Ballad of the Comforting 

Theodosia Garrison 



And I, if I be lifted from the earth, 
will draw all men unto myself. 

The eve of Golgotha had come, 

And Christ lay shrouded in the garden Tomb; 

Among the olives, oh, how dumb, 

How sad the sun incarnadined the gloom! 

118 



The hill grew dim — the pleading cross 
Reached empty arms toward the closing gate. 
Jerusalem, oh, count thy loss! 
Oh, hear ye! hear ye! ere it be too late! 



Reached bleeding arms — but how in vain! 
The murmurous multitude within the wall 
Already had forgot His pain — 
To-morrow would forget the cross — and all! 



They knew not Rome, before its sign, 

Bending her brow bound with the nation's threne, 

Would sweep all lands from Nile to Rhine 

In servitude unto the Nazarene. 



Nor knew that millions would forsake 
Ancestral shrines great with the glow of time, 
And lifting up its token shake 
iEons with thrill of love or battle's crime. 



With empty arms aloft it stood: 

Ah, Scribe and Pharisee, ye builded well! 

The cross emblotted with His blood 

Mounts, highest Hope of men, against earth's hell! 

The Empty Cross 

Cale Young Rice 
119 



Ye shall he sorrowful, hut your sorrow 
shall he turned into joy. 

There is a legend somewhere told 
Of how the skylark came of old 

To the dying Saviour's cross. 
And circling round that form of pain 
Poured forth a wild, lamenting strain, 

As if for human loss. 

Pierced by those accents of despair, 
Upon the tiny mourner there 

Turning his fading eyes. 
The Saviour said, "Dost thou so mourn 
And is thy fragile breast so torn. 

That man, thy brother, dies? 

"O'er all the world uplifted high. 
We are alone here, thou and I; 

And near to heaven and thee 
I bless thy pity-guided wings! 
I bless thy voice — the last that sings 

Love's requiem for me. 

"Sorrow no more shall fill thy song; 

These frail and fluttering wings grown strong. 

Thou shalt no longer fly 
Earth's captive — nay, but boldly dare 
The azure vault, and upward bear 

Thy transports to the sky!" 

120 



Soon passed the Saviour; but the lark. 
Close hovering near Him in the dark. 

Could not his grief abate; 
And nigh the watchers at the tomb, 
Still mourned through days of grief and gloom. 

With note disconsolate. 

But when to those sad mourners came. 

In rose and amethyst and flame. 
The Dawn Miraculous, 

Song in which sorrow had no part 

Burst from the lark's triumphant heart- 
Sweet and tumultuous! 

An instant, as with rapture blind. 
He faltered; then, his Lord to find. 

Straight to the ether flew, — 
Rising where falls no human tear. 
Singing where still his song we hear 

Piercing the upper blue! 

The Lark 
Florence Earle Coates 



/ am the Way. 



Three roads led out of Calvary. 

The first was broad and straight. 
That Pilate and great Caiaphas 

Might ride thereon in state. 

121 



The second was the felons' road. 

Cruel and hard to tread 
For those who bore the cross's load. 

For those whose footsteps bled. 

The third road slunk through mean defiles^ 

Fearing the open sky; 
And Judas crept the dreadful miles 

To Calvary thereby. 

The highroad up to Calvary 

Was blotted from the land; 
Where Judas hid, the jackal cries 

By thorn-cursed drifts of sand. 

But that poor road the felons went — 

How fair it now appears, 
Smoothed wide by myriads penitent 

And flower-set by their tears! 

The Blessed Road 
Charles Buxton Going 



There was the true light, even the light 
which lighteth every man. 

Out of the dark we come, nor know 

Into what outer dark we go. 

Wings sweep across the stars at night. 

Sweep and are lost in flight, 

And down the star-strewn windy lanes the sky 

I empty as before the wings went by. 
122 



We dare not lift our eyes, lest we should see 
The utter quiet of eternity; 
So, in the end, we come to this: 
Christ-Mary's kiss. 

We cannot brook the wide sun's might. 
We are alone and chilled by night; 
We stand, atremble and afraid. 
Upon the small worlds we have made; 
Fearful, lest all our poor control 
Should turn and tear us to the soul; 
A dread, lest we should be denied 
The price v/e hold our ragged pride; 
So in the end we cast them by 
For a gaunt cross against the sky. 

To those who question is the fine reward 

Of the brave heart who fights with broken sword 

In the dark night against an unseen enemy; 

There is not any hope of victory. 

While sweat is sweet and earthly ways and toil. 

The touch of shoulders, scent of new-turned soil. 

Striving itself amid the thrusting throng. 

And love that comes with white hands strong; 

But on itself the long path turns again. 

To find at length the hill of pain. 

Such only do we know and see; 

Starlight and evening mystery. 

Sunlight on peaks and dust-red plain. 

Thunder and the quick breath of rain, 
123 



Stirring of fields and all the lovely things 

That season after season brings; 

Young dawn and quiet night 

And the earth's might. 

But all our wisdom and our wisdom's plan 

End in the lonely figure of a Man. 

Via Crucis 
Maxwell Struthers Burt 



V 
CHRIST TRIUMPHANT 



And they shall kill him, 

and the third day he shall be raised up. 

It was a night of calls and far replies, 
A night of trembling for that Serpent head 
In gulfs that were before the eldest dead — 
A night of whispering haste along the skies, 
Prayer, and a wondering down of seraph eyes; 
While stilled Jerusalem, washed in the moon's light. 
Lay like a brood of sepulehers, ghost-white. 

The dark was dying silverly, that strange, 
StiR hour when Earth is falling toward the day — 
That hour of spacious silence and delay 
When all things poise upon the hinge of change. 
The guardsmen had grown silent on their round. 
Their fire was sinking, when a crash of sound — 
Darkness — a reel of Earth — a rush of light — 
Cleft rocks — then scent of aloes on the night! 

Their faces turned to faces of the dead. 

Their spears fell clamoring terribly as they fled. 

And He stood risen in the guarded place. 

With empire in his gesture — on his face 

U7 



The hush of muted music and the might 
That drew the stars down on the ancient night. 

Tall in the first-light, mystical and pale, 
He stood as one who dares and cannot fail. 
As some high conscript of the Bright Abodes, 
As one still called to travel on wild roads 
In Love's divine adventure — his white face 
Hushed with heroic purpose for the race; 
Yet wistful of the men who should deny Him, 
And wistful of the years that should belie Him. 

With peace of heart the blind world could not break, 
He took a path the young leaves keep awake. 
Glad of the day come back and loving all. 
He passed across the morning, felt the cool. 
Sweet, kindling air blown upward from the pool. 
A burning bush was reddening by the wall; 
An oleander bough was full of stirs. 
Struck by the robes of unseen messengers. 

The hills broke purpling, as the sun's bright edge 
Pushed slowly up behind a rocky ledge: 
The hovering dome of the Temple, gray and cold. 
Burned out with sudden, unexpected gold. 
A light wind silvered up the oHve slope. 
And all the world was wonder and wild hope! 

The Garden of the Sepulcher 

Edwin Markham 

128 



Said I not unto thee, that, if thou believedst, 
thou shouldst see the glory of God? 

Christ said to Martha by her brother's grave, 
I am the resurrection and the hfe — 
And with what troubled thoughts her mind was rife! 

The hfe. He said, and yet He freely gave 

His life, and saving others would not save 
Himself. The resurrection? Chuza's wife 
Had seen Him in the tomb — at end was strife. 

And o'er her anguish swept, a mighty wave. 

And yet her firm assurance kept her faith, 
And her reply, the fervent I believe, — 
Had not His voice raised Lazarus from death. 

Had not the grave released its four days' prey? 
A foretaste of the resurrection day 
She had to bid her wait, and not to grieve. 

Martha 
Caroline Hazard 



Father, forgive them; 

for they know not what they do. 

I was a Roman soldier in my prime; 

Now age is on me and the yoke of time. 

I saw your Risen Christ, for I am he 

Who reached the hyssop to Him on the tree; 

And I am one of two who watched beside 

The Sepulcher of Him we crucified. 
129 



All that last night I watched with sleepless eyes; 
Great stars arose and crept across the skies. 
The world was all too still for mortal rest. 
For pitiless thoughts were busy in the breast. 
The night was long, so long, it seemed at last 
I had grown old and a long Hfe had passed. 
Far off, the hills of Moab, touched with Kght, 
Were swimming in the hollow of the night. 
I saw Jerusalem all wrapped in cloud. 
Stretched like a dead thing folded in a shroud. 

Once in the pauses of our whispered talk 
I heard a something on the garden walk. 
Perhaps it was a crisp leaf lightly stirred — 
Perhaps the dream-note of a waking bird. 
Then suddenly an angel burning white 
Came down with earthquake in the breaking light. 
And rolled the great stone from the Sepulcher, 
Mixing the morning with a scent of myrrh. 
And lo, the Dead had risen with the day: 
The Man of Mystery had gone his way! 

Years have I wandered, carrying my shame; 
Now let the tooth of time eat out my name. 
For we, who all the wonder might have told, 
Kept silence, for our mouths were stopt with gold. 

A Guard of the Sepulcher 

Edwin Markham 

130 



Jesus saiih unto her, Mary! 

At dawn she sought the Saviour slain, 

To kiss the spot where He had lain 

And weep warm tears, like spring-time rain; 

When lo, there stood, unstained of death, 
A man that spoke with low sweet breath; 
And "Master!" Mary answereth. 

From out the far and fragrant years 
How sweeter than the songs of seers 
That tender offering of tears! 

Mary Magdalen 

Richard Burtok 



She turneth and saith unto him, Rabboni, 
which is to say. Teacher. 

Rabboni, in the garden sweet 
Kneel I enraptured at Thy feet. 
Thyself transfigured walkest here. 
Might such a change in me appear! 
Shall death alone illumine me? 
Nay, Soul, that were a travesty. 
Only living man can praise; 
Then touch me with Thy living rays. 

Rabboni 
Barbara Peattie Erskinb 

131 



Mary Magdalene cometh and telleth the disciples, 
I have seen the Lord. 

She brake the box, and all the house was filled 
With waftures from the fragrant store thereof. 

While at His feet a costUer rose distilled 
The bruised balm of penitential love. 

And lo, as if in recompense of her. 

Bewildered in the lingering shades of night, 

He breaks anon the sealed sepulcher. 

And fills the world with rapture and with light. 

The Recompense 

J. B. Tabb 



And your heart shall rejoice, 

and your joy no one taketh away from you. 

What though the Flowers in Joseph's Garden grew 
Of rarest perfume and of fairest hue. 
That morn when Magdalene hastened through 
Its fragrant, silent paths? 

She caught no scent of budding almond tree; 

Her eyes, tear-blinded still from Calvary, 

Saw neither lily nor anemone — 

Naught save the Sepulcher. 
132 



But when the Master whispered "Mary," lo! 
The Tomb was hid; the Garden all ablow; 
And burst in bloom the Rose of Jericho — 
From that day "Mary's Flower." 

The Sepuleher in the Garden 

John Finlet 



Was not our heart burning within us, 
while he spake to us in the way ? 

Triumphant morn whose first ray had such might 
That Life and Love, which passed beyond the ken 
And ministering care of mortal men, 

Upon this holy day could reunite! 

O Blessed sun, which saw the wondrous sight. 
The glad rebirth of primal time, as when 
The radiant sons of morn in thousands ten 

Rejoiced at that great word, Let there be light. 

The first word when the tomb was newly rent 
Was to a grieving woman gently said; 
With two sad men He walked, the day far spent. 

And how their heavy hearts within them burned 
As comforted into the inn they turned. 
And He was known to them in breaking bread! 

Easter 

Caroline Hazard 
1S3 



/ ascend unto my Father and your Father, 
and my God and your God. 

In the gray dawn they left Jerusalem, 
And I rose up to follow after them. 
He led toward Bethany by the narrow bridge 
Of Kedron, upward to the olive ridge. 
Once on the camel path beyond the City, 
He looked back, struck at heart with pain and pity- 
Looked backward from the two lone cedar trees 
On Olivet, alive to every breeze — 
Looked in a rush of sudden tears, and then 
Went steadily on, never to turn again. 

Near the green quiets of a little wood 
The Master halted silently and stood. 
The figs were purphng, and a fledghng dove 
Had fallen from a windy bough above. 
And lay there crying feebly by a thorn, 
Its little body bruised and forlorn. 
He stept aside a moment from the rest 
And put it safely back into the nest. 

Then mighty words did seem to rise in Him 

And die away; even as white vapors swim 

A moment on Mount Carmel's purple steep, 

And then are blown back rainless to the deep. 

And once He looked up with a little start: 

Perhaps some loved name passed across his heart. 

Some memory of a road in Galilee, 

Or old familiar rock beside the Sea. 

134 



And suddenly there broke upon our sight 
A rush of angels terrible with light — 
The high same host the Shepherds saw go by. 
Breaking the starry night with lyric cry — 
A rush of angels, wistful and aware. 
That shook a thousand colors on the air — 
Colors that made a music to the eye — 
Glories of lilac, azure, gold, vermilion. 
Blown from the air-hung delicate pavilion. 

And now his face grew bright with luminous will: 
The great grave eyes grew planet-like and still. 
Yea, in that moment, all his face, fire-white. 
Seemed struck out of imperishable light. 
Delicious apprehension shook his spirit. 
With song so still that only the heart could hear it. 
A sense of something sacred, starry, vast. 
Greater than earth, across his spirit passed. 

Then with a stretching of his hands to bless, 
A last unspeakable look that was caress. 
Up through the vortice of bright cherubim 
He rose until the august form grew dim — 
Up through the blue dome of the day ascended. 
By circling flights of seraphim befriended. 
He was uplifted from us, and was gone 
Into the darkness of another dawn. 

The Ascension 

Edwin Markham 



VI 

WHAT THINK YE OF 
CHRIST? 



And we have believed and know 
that thou art the Holy One of God. 

If Jesus Christ is a man — 

And only a man, — I say 
That of all mankind I cleave to him 

And to him will I cleave alway. 

If Jesus Christ is a god, — 
And the only God, — I swear 

I will follow Him through heaven and hell. 
The earth, the sea, and the air! 

The Song of a Heathen (Sojourning in Galilee, A.D. 32) 

Richard Watson Gilder 



For we did not follow cunningly devised fables, 
but we were eye-witnesses of his majesty. 

Oh He who walked with fishermen 
Was man of men in Galilee; 

He told us endless wonder-tales. 
His laugh was hale and free. 

139 



The water changed He into wine 
To please a poor man's company; 

I saw Him walk one wretched night 
Upon a troubled sea. 

And when the rabble cried for blood, 

I saw him nailed upon a tree; 
He showed how a brave man could die; 

The Prince of men was He. 

And rough men, we, who never wept. 

Wept when they nailed Him to the tree; 

Oh, He was more than man, who walked 
With us in Galilee. 

A Fisherman Speaks, Anno Domini, thirty-three 

ScHARMEL Iris 



To him be the glory 

both now and forevermore, Amen. 

Ha* we lost the goodliest fere o' all 
For the priests and the gallows tree? 
Aye lover he was of brawny men, 
O' ships and the open sea. 

When they came wi' a host to take Our Man 

His smile was good to see. 

"First let these go!" quo' our Goodly Fere, 

"Or I'll see ye damned," says he. 
140 



Aye he sent us out through the crossed high spears 
And the scorn of his laugh rang free, 
"Why took ye not me when I walked about 
Alone in the town?" says he. 

Oh we drank his "Hale" in the good red wine 

When we last made company, 

No capon priest was the Goodly Fere, 

But a man o' men was he. 

I ha* seen him drive a hundred men 
Wi* a bundle o' cords swung free. 
That they took the high and holy house 
For their pawn and treasury. 

They'll no' get him a' in a book, I think. 
Though they write it cunningly; 
No mouse of the scrolls was the Goodly Fere, 
But aye loved the open sea. 

If they think they ha' snared our Goodly Fere 
They are fools to the last degree. 
"I'll go to the feast," quo' our Goodly Fere, 
"Though I go to the gallows tree. 

"Ye ha' seen me heal the lame and blind. 

And wake the dead," says he, 

"Ye shall see one thing to master all: 

'Tis how a brave man dies on the tree." 
141 



A son of God was the Goodly Fere 
That bade us his brothers be. 
I ha' seen him cow a thousand men. 
I have seen him upon the tree. 

He cried no cry when they drave the nails 
And the blood gushed hot and free. 
The hounds of the crimson sky gave tongue 
But never a cry cried he. 

I ha' seen him cow a thousand men 

On the hills o' Galilee, 

They whined as he walked out calm between, 

Wi* his eyes like the gray o' the sea. 

Like the sea that brooks no voyaging 
With the winds unleashed and free. 
Like the sea that he cowed at Genseret 
Wi' twey words spoke' suddently. 

A master o' men was the Goodly Fere, 
A mate of the wind and sea; 
If they think they ha' slain our Goodly Fere 
They are fools eternally. 

I ha' seen him eat o' the honey-comb 
Sin' they nailed him to the tree. 

Ballad of the Goodly Fere 
Simon Zelotes Speaketh This Somewhat after the Crucifixion 

Ezra Pouni 

142 



For to me to live is Christ. 

How long have you been waiting? Not so long? 

I'm glad of that. You found the place at once. 

Well, there's the Campus Martins, when you're there 

You see above this Collis Hortulorum, 

A good place for two men like us to meet: 

Here's where luxurious souls have their abodes. 

That's Sallust's garden there. They do not care 

So much about us as some others do. 

There is a tolerance comes from being rich. 

An urbane soul is fashioned by a villa. 

Our faith is not to these a wicked thing, 

A deadly superstition as some deem it. 

But, Mark, my son, there's Rome below you there — 

What temples, arches, under the full moon! 

Here let us sit beside this chestnut tree, 

And while the soft wind blows out of the sea 

Let's finish up our talks. You must know all 

Wherewith to write the story ere I die 

Beneath the wrath of Nero. See that light, 

Faint like a little candle — I passed there. 

That's one of our poor men, they make us lamps 

Wherewith to light the streets and Nero's gardens. 

We shall be lamps they'll wish to snuff in time. 

We met to-night at one Silvanus' house. 

And I was telling them about the night 

When in Gethsemane you followed Him, 

Having a cloth about your naked body. 

And how you laid hold on him, left the cloth 

^d fled. But when you write this, you can say 

143 



'*A certain young man," leaving out your name. 
You may not wish to have it known 'twas you 
Who ran away, as I would Hke to hide 
How I fell into sleep and failed to watch. 
And afterv/ards declared I knew Him not: 
But as for me, omit no thing. The world 
Will gain by seeing me rise out of weakness 
To strength, and out of fear to boldness. Time 
Has wrought his wonders in me, I am rock. 
Let hell beat on me, I shall stand from now. 

Then don't forget the first man that He healed. 
There's deep significance in this, my son. 
That first of all He'd take an unclean spirit 
And cast it out. Then second was my mother 
Cured of her fever, just as you might say: 
Be rid of madness, things that tear and plague, 
Then cool you of the fever of vain life. 
But don't forget to write how he would say 
"Tell no man of this," say that and no more. 
Though I may think he said it lest the crowds 
That followed him would take his strength for 

healing, 
And leave no strength for words, let be and write 
"Tell no man of this" simply. For you see 
These madmen quieted, these lepers cleaned 
Had soon to die, all now are dead, perhaps. 
And with them ends their good. But what he said 
Remains for generations yet to come, with power 
To heal and heal. My son, preserve your notes, 
Of what I've told you, even above your life. 

144 



Make many copies lest one script be lost. 
I shall not to another tell it all 
As I have told it you. 

But as for me 
What merit have I that I saw and said 
"Thou art the Christ"? One sees the thing he sees. 
That is a matter of the eye — behold 
What is the eye? 

Let's think of eyes this way: 
The lawyers said there's nothing in this fellow. 
His family beheld no wonder in him. 
Have Mary Magdalen and I invented 
These words, this story? — who are we to do so, — 
A fallen woman and a fisherman! 
Or did this happen? Did we see these things? 
Did Mary see him risen and did I? 



No, Mark, my son, this is the truth, so write. 
Preserve this story taken from my lips. 
My work is almost done. Rome is the end 
Of all my labors, I have faith The Eye 
Will give me other eyes for other worlds! 

Why should I not believe this? Not all seasons 

Are for unfolding. In the winter time 

You cannot see the miracle of birth, 

Of germinating seeds, of blossoming. 

Why not then that one time for seeing Death 

145 



Go up like mist before the rising sun? 

And in this single instance of our Lord 

Arising from the grave, see all men rise, 

And all men's souls discovered in his soul, 

That quality and essence, strength made clear? 

And why not I the seer of these things? 

Why should there be another and not I? 

And I declare to you that untold millions 

In centuries untold will live and die 

By these words which you write, as I have told 

them. 
And nation after nation will be moulded. 
As heated wax is moulded, by these words. 
And spirits in their inmost power will feel 
Change and regeneration through them — well, what 

then? 
Do you say God is living, that this world. 
These constellations move by law, that all 
This miracle of life and light is held 
In harmony, and that the soul of man 
Moves not in order, but that it's allowed 
To prove an anarch to itself, sole thing 
That turns upon itself, sole thing that's shown 
The path that leads no whither? is allowed 
To feed on falsehood? that it's allowed 
To wander lawless to its ruin, fooled 
By what it craves, by what it feels, by eyes 
That swear the truth of what they see? by words 
Which you will write from words I have affirmed? 
And do you say that Life shall prove the foe 
Of life, and Law of law? Or do you say 

146 



The child's eyes see reality which see 

The poppy blossoms or the mother's breast, 

And this Rome and these stars do not exist 

Because the child's eyes cannot compass them. 

And get their image? Shall we trust our vision 

Mounting to higher things, or only trust 

Those things which all have seen except the souls 

Who have not soared, or risen to the gift 

Of seeing what seemed walking trees grow clear 

As men or angels? No, it cannot be. 

Man's soul, the chiefest flower of all we know. 

Is not the toy of Malice or of Sport. 

It is not set apart to be betrayed. 

Or gulled to its undoing, left to dash 

Its hopeless head against this rock's exception. 

No water for its thirst, no Life to feed it. 

No law to guide it, though this universe 

Is under Law, no God to mark its steps. 

Except the God of worlds and suns and stars. 

Who loves it not, loves worlds and suns and stars. 

And them alone, and leaves the soul to pass 

Unfathered — lets me have a madman's dream 

And gives it such reality that I 

Take fire and light the world, convincing eyes 

Left foolish to believe. It cannot be . . . 

Go write what I have told you, come what will 
I'm going to the catacombs to pray. 

The Gospel of Mark 

Edgar Lee Masters 

147 



And not a few of them that practised 
magical arts, brought their books together, 
end burned them in the sight of all. 

Hyacinthus, your money, the idol you ordered is finished. 
May the grace of Diana be with you in strength un- 
diminished. 

Behold how the breast of it gHtters, as if it were wrought 

in with stipples. 
The Ephesian goddess is Nature and these are her 

bountiful nipples. 

So then do I fear for my trade? No, never! It's past 

my conceiving. 
There'll be work for the artist while gods change to 

win our believing 

Come on then, you babblers and madmen from Jewry 

and tell us and show us — 
Yes, come with your tumult the like of which never 

was known in Corinth or Troas. 

They crowd in the markets and temples and gabble 

a story that palters. 
Well, I whistle and hammer the silver, a maker of 

statues and altars. 

Who says I am wroth lest in Samothrace, Lystra and 

Delos 
The craft of the maker of images fail through the speech 

of thf'.se fellows.'^ 

148 



And the temple of Artemis perish? Oh, well, however 

they hate us 
Can they burn it as once it was burned by the wretch 

Herostratus? 

But we built it again and carved it all newly in beauty 

and wonder — 
Destroy it, oh man, who was crazed by lightning and 

roaring of thunder! 

Oh virgin Diana, if virgin, what virgin whose altar 

is older! 
If matron what breasts hang with milk for the eyes 

of her temples' beholder! 

For centuries gone — when these Jews prayed to ser- 
pents of bronze and to calves that were golden. 

In Ephesus, Arcady, Athens, our reverent love was 
beholden 

To the goddess of prophecy, music, the lyre, of light, 
inspiration. 

Who guarded and watches the city and lays the foun- 
dation 

Of nations and laws. What works we have done, yea 

still we would heed her — 
And look at your barbarous ark in your temple of 

jewels and cedar! 

149 



What is our pollution, our idols, our sacrificed things 

which are strangled? 
I ask you already divided in turbulent parties who 

wrangled 

Concerning salvation of God to the faith of the un- 

circumcision 
In Cyprus and Paphos, where poets of love keep the 

Hellenic vision. 

I am filled with my loathing! Oh keep me a Greek 

though you make me a whoreson. 
When the worship of beauty is dead you may pare 

off my foreskin. 

When the symbol is dead which I mould to Diana 

our goddess 
I'll retire to the country of Nod, no matter where Nod is. 

It will live when your temples are built, if any are 

builded. 
And Jesus in silver is nailed on a cross which is gilded. 

And touching this thing is it different to worship a 

man or abstraction .^^ 
Or an idol of silver or stone? — go talk to your spirit's 

distraction ! 

Areopagus listened to Paul, I am told, for Athens is 
spending 

Her time, as of old, in weighing new things and at- 
tending. 

150 



They heard him in silence! Let his arguments pass 
uncorrected — 

Why, Plato had told us of Er from the dead resur- 
rected ! 

Now, mark me! For showing the wisdom, compas- 
sion of poets and sages 

That silence like lightning will aureole Paul to the end 
of the ages. 

Oh Athens, who set up that shrine, do you think it 

was just superstition 
Which carved for all passers to see that profoundest 

inscription : 

To the unknown God? Do you think it was cow- 
ardice even? 

Make altars and gods as you will, unknown is the 
planeted heaven. 

And we who are richest in gods — have exhausted all 

thought in creating 
Both symbols and shapes for interpreted loving and 

hating. 

Still sense the Unknown, though in blindness, in love 
as in duty 

Would worship it most — the Unknown is the ulti- 
mate beauty. 

151 



Yes, Athens who set up the altar and chiseled the 

worshipful letters 
To the Unknown God — what ignorance fastened with 

fetters 

Did you loosen, oh wonder of Tarsus, how help their 

unknowing 
Who told them he dwelt not in temples, nor heeded 

the flowing 

Of prayers from men's hearts — the Giver of life and 

of all things, and seeing 
He is lord of the heavens, in whom we are living and 

having our being. 

So quoting our poet who centuries since with the 

monarch Gonatus 
Lived and wrote Phaenomena, known to the Greeks 

as Aratus. 

And yet, Hyacinthus, I pity this Paul for profoundest 

compassion 
Of Jesus before him. This sky and this earth I can 

fashion 

Through mystical wonder or fear to the Sphinx or 

the Minotaur dreaded. 
There's Persephone dying and rising, and Cerberus 

the dog many-headed. 

152 



We have thought it all through ! Yet I say if a virtue 

Elysian 
Besides in the doctrine I'll leave off the goddess Ephe- 

sian; 

Sell my tools, shut my shop, worship God in a way 

that is safer. 
Make the Unknown the known! Have they shown 

you a magical wafer? 

The Apology of Demetrius 

Edgar Lee Masters 



He that loveth his life shall lose it; 
but he that hateth his life in this world 
shall keep it unto life eternal. 

The lengthening shadows of the cedar trees 
Have blended into twilight, and the sun 
Has plunged in glorious gold precipitance 
Beyond the dim crest of the western hills. 
Bearing with it the day's disquietudes; 
And now the stars, that lamp the feet of God, 
Are lighted, and night's purple silences 
Steal gently round me fraught with memories. 

'Twas such an hour as this — long, long ago 
Yet seeming yesterday — ^he came to me, 
My little son, in joyous travail born 
Out there across the hills in Bethlehem, 

153 



Where we who journeyed southward to be taxed — 
Strangers in our own father's land — had found 
No shelter in the crowded khan, and shared, 
Perforce, a grotto with the stabled kine. 

Ah, how it all comes back again to me! 
The court-yard, in the flickering torchlight, filled 
With huddled trav'lers sleeping 'neath the sky, 
The kneeling camels of a caravan. 
The patient asses dozing by the wall, 
A smell of roasting meat at little fires. 
The shouts of melon-sellers, the low drone 
Of reverend elders bending at their prayers. 
Barking of street-dogs, porters' blasphemies. 
The laughter of a girl, the mellow flute 
Of some rapt lover, and the tinkling tune 
Of sheep-bells forward moving through the dark. 
And then the hour supreme, wherein my soul 
Clomb the dark pinnacles of pain, and death 
Grappled with life through whirling seoned years. 
But fled at length and left the Miracle. 

They laid him there beside me on the hay, 

A wee pink being in his world's first sleep; 

My arm was round about him and his breath 

Was warm with life on my exultant breast, 

And they whose winged watch is set to keep 

Ward in the valley lands of Heaven looked down 

Not up that night to find their Paradise. 

All weak with labor and soul's happiness 

I lay beneath the sapphire tent of skies, 
154 



And in my heart I made a little prayer 
Of thanks that flew up to the throne of God 
On swift dove pinions of unuttered song; 
And as I prayed, lo, upon loops of stars 
Night's velvet eurtainings were hfted up, 
A wondrous light turned all the world to rose. 
And down the skies swept singing seraphim 
In mighty echoes of my little prayer. 

Oh, can it be that threescore years have marched 
In troubled caravan across the waste 
Of desert life since then, and can it be 
That I, who sit here in mine eventide. 
White with the snows of sorrow and of time. 
Was once a bright tressed girl who heard the choirs 
Of Heaven rejoice that she had borne a son? 
Why, I can feel that little heart beat still 
Close to my own, the touch of little hands 
Warm and caressing on this withered breast; 
Still I can hear the first low wail that marked 
His woe's beginning and the tortured path 
That he should tread in mighty gentleness. 
With pain and anguish, 'til His love supreme 
And terrible meekness, overcoming death. 
Should lead Him conqueror to sit with God, 
Pleading for sinful men in Paradise. 

To-day I stole into the synagogue 

And heard a rabbi read the sacred scroll: 

How that my lord, Isaiah, said of old. 

Thy Maker is thy husband, he hath called thee 
155 



As a forsaken woman, spirit grieved; 
Gody for a little moment hides His face 
From thee, hut with His loving kindness soon 
And tender mercies, shall He gather thee. 
Then was I comforted, and peace displaced 
The turmoil in my heart, and minded me 
Of that great promise Gabriel bore from God 
And the immeasurable fruitage of His word, 
The life and death and glory of my son. 

So in the shades of life and night I sit, 

Under the sheltering arbor of the dark 

That curves above, vined o'er with trellised stars, 

Waiting my spirit bridegroom, and the sound 

Of that loved voice — ^long silent save in dreams — 

Calling across the vibrant firmament, 

Mary, Mother Mary, come to Me. 

Mused Mary in Old Age 

George M. P. Baibo 



The hour comeih, that whosoever killeth you 
shall think that he offered service unto God. 

The monarch looked out from his throne 

Where the Bosphorus blends with the Horn, 

And he saw how at evening and morn 

The people would prayerfully bow 

To figures of bronze and of stone; 

And he cried, as he smote on his brow, 
156 



"They worship the image alone; 
Forgot is the Godhead behind. 
Their prayers are but words on the wind 
That hither and thither are blown." 

Then an edict went forth from the south 
To the north of the empire afar, 
And a herald with clamorous mouth 
Proclaimed it in hamlet and town. 
Till the folk as by rumors of war 
Were stirred, or by famine and drouth. 
For from niche and from altar and shrine 
The Christ and the Virgin divine 
Must be cast desecratingly down. 

So rage slumbered hot in the heart 

In Constantine's city, the old; 

And murmurs waxed loud in the mart 

And the tongues of the people grew bold. 

But the monarch was firm; and the more. 

When he heard of the stir in the state. 

Was his spirit alert and elate. 

And naught in his rashness sufficed 

But to cry to the guard at the door, 

"Thou knowest the image of Christ 

Surmounting the palace's gate. 

Go thou, take thy weapon and smite. 

In the emperor's name and the right!" 

The guardsman was pallid with fear, 

For he knew how the Christ was adored, 
157 



But he only could bow and obey. 

Passing forth on his perilous way 

With his hand gripping tight on his sword. 

By the gate was a woman in prayer. 

Who, when she beheld his intent. 

Cried loud to the heralding air. 

Till there gathered around her a score. 

There were crones in decrepitude bent. 

And mothers, and maids who were fair. 

To beg and beseech and implore. 

But he gave little heed to their cries 

For he dreaded the emperor's ire; 

He saw not the light in their eyes. 

The baleful and dangerous fire. 

The ladder was scaled, and his hand 

Uplifted the merciless brand; 

A glimmer of steel and a blow. 

And the image fell clanging below 

In the midst of the sorrowful band. 

In a moment their grief was forgot. 
And a frenzy possessed them instead. 
Afar from the doom-fated spot 
Would the terrified guardsman have fled; 
But they seized him in madness, and tore 
His limbs in their maniac might. 
And dabbled their hands in his gore. 
And shouted in eager delight 
That Christ was avenged evermore. 



A tale of the shadowy past 
Obscured by the mists of the years, 

158 



Where, down all the distance, one hears 
Fanatical echoes of strife. 
Oh, why, from the first to the last. 
Should His name, that the spirit reveres. 
Be blent with the clashing of spears 
Where frenzy and slaughter are rife! 

Love, love was the creed that He taught. 
And peace, perfect peace, everywhere; 
The past that is dead is as naught, 
The present and future are fair. 
Could we but see over the tomb 
The flowers of Christ's tenderness bloom. 
Grand, grand were the ages to come. 
For the voices of strife would be dumb! 

The Bronze Christ 

Clinton Scollard 



Unto them that are called, both Jews and Greeks, 
Christ, the 'power of God, and the wisdom of God. 

So long, so long ago I had been slain 

By blindness malice-led, I scarce could tell 

What soul it was that trod in weary pain 
The vestibule of hell. 

Only at times a sick dream came to me 
That once I had been Baldur and erstwhile 

The gods in heaven had rejoiced to see 
The glory of my smile. 

159 



In the Dim Country's languor I had lost 
The way of smihng, and all genial words 

Fell dumb at the near breath of Hela's frost 
Like winter-smitten birds. 

In that gray land of failure, we who died 

Inglorious deaths, nourished our shadowy shame. 

Meeting we turned our downward gaze aside 
Before the Stranger came. 

Across our hush I heard his quick feet ring. 
For like a warrior fresh from fight he trod. 

I looked him in the eyes, remembering 
That I had been a god — 

Remembering that promise of a throne 
Upon the ashes of the burnt-out earth, — 

A perfect kingdom rising all mine own 
From worthlessness to worth. 



A sudden laughter shook the still dank air 
Like the clear causeless laughter of a child. 

Over the dusky meadows, bleak and bare, 
All the Dim Country smiled. 

And one went singing in the gloom — "Behold, 

Baldur comes down to the dishonored dead.. 

What, shall we find the ways too murk and cold 

That the Bright God can tread.'* 
160 



"Here in this land of dreams that are no more 
And spent desires, he laughs, — and in his eyes 

In forms more glorious than once they bore 
We see our dead hopes rise." 

"Ashes of earth upon hell's midden cast. 
From these," I cried, " shall Baldur build his throne — 

But, oh, the wasted ages that I passed 
Unknowing and unknown — 

"Nay, was I Baldur till I met thine eyes? 

Thine be the throne!" But, lo, he was not there, — 
Only aMvakened world, and a surprise 

Of morning in the air. 

Baldur in Niflheim 
Amelia Josephine Burr 



A light for revelation 
to the Gentiles. 

Before Christ left the Citadel of Light, 

To tread the dreadful way of human birth. 
His shadow sometimes fell upon the earth 

And those who saw it wept with joy and fright. 

"Thou art Apollo, than the sun more bright!" 

They cried. "Our music is of little worth. 
But thrill our blood with thy creative mirth 

Thou god of song, thou lord of lyric might!" 

161 



O singing pilgrim! who could love and follow 
Your lover Christ, through even love's despair. 

You knew within the cypress-darkened hollow 
The feet that on the mountain are so fair. 

For it was Christ that was your own Apollo, 
And thorns were in the laurel on your hair. 

His Laureate 

Joyce Kilmer 



There can he neither Jew nor Greek; 
for ye are all one man in Christ Jesus. 

Man of my own people, I alone 
Among these alien ones can know thy face, 

1 who have felt the kinship of thy race 
Burn in me as I sit where they intone 

Thy praises, — those who, striving to make known 
A God for sacrifice, have missed the grace 
Of thy sweet human meaning in its place. 
Thou who art of our blood-bond and our own. 

Are we not sharers of thy Passion? Yea, 

In spirit-anguish closely by thy side 

We have drained the bitter cup, and, tortured, felt 

With thee the bruising of the heavy welt. 

In every land is our Gethsemane. 

A thousand times have we been crucified. 

The Jew to Jesus 

Florence Kiper Frank 

162 



That they may know the mystery 
of God, even Christ. 

Dear intimate of little folk, if now 

You seem too incommensm-ably great. 

Is it because 'tis easier to abate 

Our faith than equal it with yours? — ^to allow 

You the divine advantage, than avow 

That other human hearts are designate 

To share your mastery and free estate? 

To you as God, we, unbelieving bow — 

To you that, verily divine, have trod 

The way to godhood; who, being simple, wed 

Your love to Life's Almighty Will, and lo. 

Upon the instant, like a river-head 

Upspringing in your flesh, began to flow 

Anew the world-creating power of God. 

To Jesus 

Henry Bryan Bin^s 



VII 
THE WORLD'S JESUS 



Go ye into all the world, and preach 
the gospel to the whole creation. 

Out from the doomed Jerusalem, in days of long ago, 
By two and two they sallied forth to lands of sun or 

snow; 
And each slow century since then has seen this loyal 

clan 
Break out to bear the blessed news to all the sons of 

man. 

Beside the slim, tall temples, where the tawny rivers run. 

They set their tents where shining stars looked down 
on Babylon. 

Through Memphis' linteled gates they passed, and sang 
a holy psalm, 

Where carven gods looked down on them in imme- 
morial calm. 

Their bare feet pressed the beaten shore, beneath dark 

Nubia's cliffs; 
They ate the corn from out their scrips, where Kar- 

nak's hieroglyphs 
Tell how the world's gray mother, dead, beside old 

Nilus lies. 
And held the lifted cross before Assyria's glazing eyes. 

167 



Down to imperial Rome they drew, o'er the Cam- 

pagna's turf. 
Nor halted where the rocky shore flung back the 

roaring surf. 
But spread the sails, and, unafraid, across the seething 

main 
Steered where the wild Atlantic lashed the pillared 

front of Spain. 

In single file, on lonely paths, they walked through 
forests dim, 

And stirred the Saxon silence with their solemn matin 
hymn; 

The bloom of Irish primroses fell on their wandering 
feet. 

And heather on the Scottish hills made all their gar- 
ments sweet. 

Beside the stormy Northern capes they taught the 

Vikings bold 
And in the English meadows green the wondrous tale 

they told; 
Amid the cairns, among the oaks, they reared the holy 

crypt. 
And dared to tell of dying Love, where Druid altars 

dripped. 

And still o'er all the earth they fare, where'er a soul 

has need; 
Idy heart leaps up and calls to them: O Brothers 

mine! God speed! 



What time within the jungle deep ye watch the day- 
light die, 

Or on some lonely Indian steep see dawn flush all the 
sky. 

Far is the cry from here to there, yet hearken when 

we say: 
Ye are the brethren of the Book; in Kliartoum or 

Cathay, 
'Tis ye who make the record good, 'tis ye, O royal 

souls ! 
Who justify the Chronicles, writ in the ancient scrolls. 

O Missionaries of the Blood! Ambassadors of God! 
Our souls flame in us when we see where ye have 

fearless trod 
At break of day; your dauntless faith our slackened 

valor shames. 
And every eve our joyful prayers are jeweled with your 

names. 

The Missionaries 

Robert McIntyre 



That the love icherewith thou lovest me 
may be in them and I in them! 

What means this waiting throng? 
Whence have these weary wayworn wanderers come? 
Why rises, in strange tongues, the expectant hum. 
Like that tense under-song 

169 



The joyful Jordan voicej in the spring 
Till Hermon hearkens, leaning grandly down. 
And wearing still his glimmering snowy crown? 
Soon will these murmuring lips with ardor sing, 
And soon these lifted faces, wan or brown, 
Glow into worship that is rapturing. 
Back will be thrown the consecrated door. 
And then these feet, from many a distant shore. 
Be privileged to press the hallowed floor. 

Why they have come, — the hardy mountaineer 

From Lebanon's cedars and their checkered shade? 

The merchant and the snowy-mantled maid 

Who hold great Nilus dear? 

Why have they come, — the men with restless eyes 

And pallid cheeks that tell of norland skies? 

Why have they come, — the Latin and the Greek? 

Do pilgrims thus this sanctuary seek 

Because 'tis here 

For year on forty year 

The red earth drank 

The deluged blood of Paynim and of Frank? 

Or do they surge to see 

The antique symmetry 

Of springing arch and carven pillar fine. 

In this old holy house of Constantine? 

Ah, no! ah, no! To them the memory 
Of war is not, and monarchs play no part 
In any thought that stirs an eager heart. 
They have no eyes to see 

170 



A single graceful groining. What care they 

If here, upon a bygone Christmas-day 

The King-Crusader, Baldwin, took his crown! 

Or what to them the saint of blest renown 

In yonder sepulcher, now crumbling clay! 

Their patient feet one precious spot would press. 

Their yearning eyes would lovingly caress 

The time-dulled silver star 

Sunk deep within the pavement, footfall- worn : 

''Here, of the Virgin Mary, Christ was horuy^ 

They read, these pilgrims who have plodded far. 

They read and pass and ponder. Few can see 

The tiny chapel and the dim-lit shrine. 

And feel no thrill, despite the mummery. 

Of something more divine 

Within the breast than ever pulsed before. 

Then let us pilgrims be 

Upon this sacred day we all adore! 

Although our mortal feet touch not the floor. 

Although our mortal eyes may not behold. 

Our spirits may take flight. 

And with immortal sight 

Stand where the prayerful wise-men stood of old 

In ecstasy of adoration, when 

They saw the Saviour of the sons of men. 

The Christmas Pilgrimage (Bethlehem) 

Clinton Scollard 



171 



We have the mind of Christ. 

I cannot put the Presence by, of Him, the Crucified, 
Who moves men's spirits with His love as doth the 

moon the tide; 
Again I see the Life He lived, the godlike Death He 

died. 

Again I see upon the cross that great Soul-battle 

fought, 
Into the texture of the world the tale of which is wrought 
Until it hath become the woof of human deed and 

thought,— 

And, joining with the cadenced bells that all the morn- 
ing fill. 
His cry of agony doth yet my inmost being thrill. 
Like some fresh grief from yesterday that tears the 
heart-strings still. 

r 

^ I cannot put His presence by, I meet Him everywhere; 
I meet Him in the country town, the busy market- 
square; 
The Mansion and the Tenement attest His presence 
{ there. 

Upon the funneled ships at sea He sets His shining feet; 

The Distant Ends of Empire not in vain His Name 

repeat, — 

And, like the presence of a rose. He makes the whole 

world sweet. 

172 



He comes to break the barriers down raised up by 
barren creeds; 

About the globe from zone to zone, like sunlight He 
proceeds; 

He comes to give the World's starved heart the per- 
fect love it needs, — 

The Christ, Whose friends have played Him false, 

Whom Dogmas have belied. 
Still speaking to the hearts of men — tho' shamed and 

crucified. 
The Master of the centuries Who will not be denied! 

The Voice of Christmas 

Harry Kemp 



And the Word became flesh, and 
dwelt among us. 

On Christmas Eve, so runs the marvellous tale. 
Heaven once flashed through her amethystine veil. 
And while this raptured earth beheld and heard 
Those star-eclipsing choirs, the Eternal Word 
Put on our flesh to bear our human bale. 

Faint with the sweets such sanctities exhale. 
Deep-brooding Doubt lets fall his winnowing flail. 
And feels his weary heart divinely stirred 
On Christmas Eve. 

173 



For sudden lustres play o'er hill and dale. 
The silence thrills with music, mothers pale 
Smile like Madonnas, and the Christ, unblurred 
By mists of time, unslain, unsepulchred. 
Life's cup reconsecrates to Holy Grail 
On Christmas Eve. 

On Christmas Eve 

Katharine Lee Bates 



/ press toward the goal unto the prize 

of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. 

If I had been in Palestine 

A poor disciple I had been. 

I had not risked or purse or limb 

All to forsake, and follow Him. 

But with the vast and wondering throiig 
I too had stood and listened long; 
I too had felt my spirit stirred 
When the Beatitudes I heard. 

With the glad crowd that sang the psalm, 
I too had sung, and strewed the palm; 
Then slunk away in dastard shame 
When the High Priest denounced His name. 
But when my late companions cried 
"Away! let Him be crucified!" 
I would have begged, with tremulous 
Pale lips, "Release Him unto us!" 

174, 



Beside the cross when Mary prayed, 

A great way off I too had stayed; 

Not even in that hour had dared. 

And for my dying Lord declared; 

But beat upon my craven breast. 
And loathed my coward heart, at least. 
To think my life I dared not stake 
And beard the Romans for His sake. 

Judge me, Lord! 

Sarah N. Cleghorn 



Whx) shall separate us from 
the love of Christ ? 



O man of light and lore! 

Do you mean that in our day 

The Christ hath passed away; 

That nothing now is divine 

In the fierce rays that shine 

Through every cranny of thought; 

That Christ as He once was taught 

Shall be the Christ no more? 

That the Hope and Saviour of men 

Shall be seen no more again; 

That, miracles being done. 

Gone is the Holy One? 

And thus, you hold, this Christ 

For the past alone suflSced; 

175 



From the throne of the hearts of the world 

The Son of God shall be hurled, 

And henceforth must be sought 

New prophets and kings of thought; 

That the tenderest, truest word 

The heart of sorrow hath heard 

Shall sound no more upon earth; 

That he who hath made of birth 

A dread and sacred rite; 

Who hath brought to the eyes of death 

A vision of heavenly light. 

Shall fade with our failing faith; — 

He who saw in children's eyes 

Eternal paradise; 

Who made the poor man's lowly 

Labor a service holy. 

And sweat of work more sweet 

Than incense at God's feet; 

Who turned the God of Fear 

To a Father, bending near; 

Who looked through shame and sin 

At the sanctity within; 

Whose memory, since he died. 

The earth hath sanctified — 

Hath been the stay and the hold 

Of millions of lives untold. 

And the world on its upward path 

Hath led from crime and wrath;— 

You say that this Christ hath passed 

And we cannot hold him fast? 
176 



II 

Ah, no! If the Christ you mean 

Shall pass from this time, this scene. 

These hearts, these lives of ours, 

'Tis but as the summer flowers 

Pass but return again. 

To gladden the world of men. 

For he, — the only, the true, — 

In each age, in each waiting heart. 

Leaps into life anew. 

Tho* he pass, he shall not depart. 

Behold him now where he comes! 

Not the Christ of our subtle creeds. 

But the lord of our hearts, of our homes. 

Of our hopes, our prayers, our needs; 

The brother of want and blame. 

The lover of women and men. 

With a love that puts to shame 

All passions of mortal ken; — 

Yet of all of women born 

His is the scorn of scorn; 

Before whose face do fly 

Lies and the love of a lie; 

Who from the temple of God 

And the sacred place of laws 

Drives forth, with smiting rod. 

The herds of ravening maws. 

'Tis he, as none other can. 
Makes free the spirit of man, 

177 



And speaks, in darkest night. 

One word of awful light 

That strikes through the dreadful pain 

Of life, a reason sane — 

That word divine which brought 

The universe from naught. 

Ah, no, thou life of the heart. 
Never shalt thou depart! 
Not till the leaven of God 
Shall lighten each human clod; 
Not till the world shall climb 
To thy height serene, sublime, 
Shall the Christ who enters our door 
Pass to return no more. 

The Passing of Christ 

Richard Watson Gilder 



Every good gift and every perfect 
gift is from above, coming 
down from the Father of lights. 

Lord, I am just a little boy 

Born one day like You, 
And I've got a mother dear 

And a birthday too. 
But my birthday comes in spring. 

When the days are long. 
And the robin in the tree 

Wakens me with song. 

178 



Since the birds are all away. 

Lord, when You are born. 
Let Your angels waken me 

On Your birthday morn. 

Lord, I'm just a little boy, 

Hidden in the night: 
Let Your angels spy me out 

Long before it's light. 
I would be the first to wake 

And the first to raise 
In this quiet home of ours 

Songs of love and praise. 
You shall hear me first, dear Lord, 

Blow my Christmas horn; 
Let Your angels waken me 

On Your birthday morn. 

A Child's Christmas Song 

T. A. Daly 



This is the victory that overcometh 
the world, even our faith. 

All these on whom the sacred seal was set. 

They could forsake thee while thine eyes were wet. 

Brother, not once have I believed in thee, 

Yet having seen I cannot once forget. 

179 



I have looked long into those friendly eyes, 
And found thee dreaming, fragile, and unwise. 
Brother, not once have I believed in thee. 
Yet have I loved thee for thy gracious lies. 

One broke thee with a kiss at eventide. 

And he that loved thee well has thrice denied. 

Brother, I have no faith in thee at all, 

Yet must I seek thy hands, thy feet, thy side. 

Behold that John that leaned upon thy breast; 
His eyes grew heavy and he needs must rest. 
I watched unseen through dark Gethsemane 
And might not slumber, for I loved thee best. 

Peace thou wilt give to them of troubled mind. 

Bread to the hungry, spittle to the blind. 

My heart is broken for my unbelief. 

But that thou canst not heal though thou art kind. 

They asked one day to sit beside thy throne. 
I made one prayer, in silence and alone. 
Brother, thou knowest my unbelief in thee. 
Bear not my sins, for thou must bear thine own. 

Even he that grieves thee most "Lord, Lord," he saith. 
So will I call on thee with my last breath! 
Brother, not once have I believed in thee. 

Yet I am wounded for thee unto death. 

An Unbeliever 

Anna Hempstead Branch 

180 



He came and preached peace 
to you that were jar off. 

It is said the Bedouins cry, on the Syrian hills, a clear 
Loud summons to War, and the tribes far distant 

hearken and hear, 
So wondrous rare is the air, so crystal the atmosphere. 
Their call is to arms; but One, in the centuries long 

ago. 
Spake there for Peace, in tones that were marvellous 

sweet and low. 
And the ages they hear Him yet, and His voice do 

the nations know. 

On Syrian Hills 

Richard Burton 



Beloved, let us love one another, 
for love is of God. 

My father prayed as he drew a bead on the graycoats. 
Back in those blazing years when the house was 

divided. 
Bless his old heart! There never was truer or 

kinder; 
Yet he prayed, while hoping the ball from his clumsy 

old musket 
Might thud to the body of some hot-eyed young 

Southerner 
And tumble him limp in the mud of the Vicksburg 

trenches. 

181 



That was my father, serving the Lord and his 

country, 
Praying and shooting whole-heartedly. 
Never a doubt. 
And now what about 
Me in my own day of battle? 
Gould I put my prayers behind a slim Springfield 

bullet? 
Hardly, except to mutter: "Jesus, we part here. 
My country calls for my body, and takes my soul 

also. 
Do you see those humans herded and driven against 

me? 
Turn away, Jesus, for I've got to kill them. 
Why? Oh, well, it's the way of my fathers. 
And such evils bring some vast, vague good to my 

country. 
I don't know why, but to-day my business is killing. 
And my gods must be luck and the devil till this 

thing is over. 
Leave me now. Lord. Your eye makes me slack in 

my duty." 
My father could mix his prayers and his shooting. 
And he was a rare true man in his generation. 
Now, I'm fairly decent in mine, I reckon; 
Yet if I should pray like him, I'd spoil it by laughing. 
What is the matter? 

My Father and I 
Charles Badger Clark, Jr. 

182 



Christ also suffered, the righteous 
for the unrighteous. 

They have dressed me up in a soldier's dress. 

With a rifle in my hand, 
And have sent me bravely forth to shoot 

My own in a foreign land. 

Oh, many shall die for the fields of their homes, 

And many in conquest wild, 
But I shall die for the fatherland 

That murdered my little child. 

How many hundreds of years ago — 

The nations wax and cease! — 
Did the God of our fathers doom us to bear 

The flaming message of peace! 

We are the mock and the sport of time! 

Yet why should I complain! — 
For the Jew that they hung on the bloody cross. 

He also died in vain. 

The Jewish Conscript (in Russia) 

Florence Kiper Frank 



Far be it from me to glory, save 

in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

At the high ridge 

Of a wide war-stricken realm 

There stands an ancient wooden Christ. 

183 



Hollow the tottering image towers, 

Eyeless, and rotten, and decrepit there. 

His smile a cruel twist. 

Within the empty heart of this old Christ 

Small stinging insects build their nests; 

And iron-hearted soldiers cross themselves 

The while they pass 

The hollow-hearted figure by. 

I think there is no Christ left there 
In all those carnage-loving lands 
Save only this of hollow wood 
With wasp nests 
Hiving in its heart. 

The Wooden Christ 

Martha Foote Ceow 

Written before Good Friday, 1917. 

/ will fray the Father, and he shall 
give you another Comforter, that he 
he with you forever. 

Under our curtain of fire. 

Over the clotted clouds. 

We charged, to be withered, to reel 

And despairingly wheel 

When the bugles bade us retire. 

From the terrible odds. 

As we ebbed with the battle-tide. 
Fingers of red-hot steel 
Suddenly closed on my side. 

184 



I fell, and began to pray. 
I crawled on my hands and lay 
Where a shallow crater yawned wide; 
Then, — I swooned . . . 

When I woke it was yet day. 
Fierce was the pain of my wound; 
But I saw it was death to stir. 
For fifty paces away 
Their trenches were. 
In torture I prayed for the dark 
And the stealthy step of my friend 
Who, staunch to the very end. 
Would creep to the danger-zone 
And offer his life as a mark 
To save my own. 

Night fell. I heard his tread, — 

Not stealthy, but firm and serene. 

As if my comrade's head 

Were lifted from that scene 

Of passion and pain and dread; 

As if my comrade's heart 

In carnage took no part; 

As if my conu-ade's feet 

Were set on some radiant street 

Such as no darkness could haunt; 

As if my comrade's eyes 

No deluge of flame could surprise. 

No death and destruction daunt, 
185 



No red-beaked bird dismay. 

Nor sight of decay. 

Then in the bursting shells' dim light, 

I saw he was clad in white. 

For a moment I thought that I saw the smock 

Of a shepherd in search of his flock. 

Alert were the enemy, too. 

And their bullets flew 

Straight at a mark no bullet could fail: 

For the seeker was tall and his robe was bright; 

But he did not flee nor quail. 

Instead, with unhurrying stride. 

He came. 

And, gathering my tall frame, 

Like a child in his arms . . . 

Again I swooned; 

And awoke 

From a blissful dream 

In a cave by a stream. 

My silent comrade had bound my side. 

No pain now was mine, but a wish that I spoke, — 

A mastering wish to serve this man 

Who had ventured through hell my doom to revoke, 

As only the truest of comrades can. 

I begged him to tell me how best I might aid him. 

And urgently prayed him 

Never to leave me, whatever betide; 

When I saw he was hurt — 

Shot through the hands that were clasped in prayer! 

Then, as the dark drops gathered there 

186 



And fell in the dirt. 

The wounds of my friend 

Seemed to me such as no man might bear. 

Those bullet-holes in the patient hands 

Seemed to transcend 

All horrors that ever these war-drenched lands 

Had known or would know till the mad world's end. 

Then suddenly I was aware 

That his feet had been wounded, too, 

And, dimming the white of his side 

A dull stain grew. 

"You are hurt. White Comrade!" I cried. 

His words I already foreknew: 

"These are old wounds," said he, 

"But of late they have troubled me." 

The White Comrade 
Robert Haven Schauffleb 



Let not your heart be troubled, 
neither let it be afraid. 

Perhaps they had no time to think of Him, 
Those comfortable men, when business urged; 
And where the dusty whirl of pleasure surged 
The memory of His face no doubt grew dim — 
But when they turned from safety and content. 
Unflinchingly laid by 
The tools of their prosperity, and went 
To suffer and to die 

187 



For just a thought, a disembodied dream 

That some call Nothing — when they knew the 

wrench 
Of raveled nerves, the squalor of the trench, 
The dying look's reproach, the scarlet steam 
Of battle hand to hand — amid that hell 
Of agony they looked into the eyes 
They had not seen, in days when all was well. 
Out of the marsh of death they saw Him rise 
In the white robes that gladdened Galilee, 
Walking the hot red waves of blood and flame 
As long ago He came 

To those that laboured on a troubled sea. 
And they, who had forgotten Him so long, 
Remembered that those wounded hands were strong 
And infinitely kind . . . 
O Lord of Love! shall we not understand. 
Who in our comfort are as grossly blind .'^ 
We prosper to the height of our desire — 
How should our rich and busy hands require 
Aught of the Wounded Hand.f* 
Till comes a day when we are under fire. 
Spent, bleeding, stripped of our complacent pride. 
And beaten to the last extremity, 
Then, a living presence at our side. 
White Comrade, we find — Thee! 

The White Comrade 
* Amelia Josephine Burr 

188 



We are compassed about with so great 
a cloud of witnesses f 

Ours is a dark Easter-tide and a scarlet Spring, 
But high up at Heaven's gate all the saints sing, 
Glad for the great companies returning to their King! 

Oh, in youth the dawn's a rose, dusk an amethyst, 
All the roads from dusk to dawn, gay they wind and 

twist — 
The old road to Paradise, easy it is missed! 

But out on the wet battle-fields, few the roadways 

wind, 
One to grief, one to death, no road that's kind — 
The old road to Paradise, plain it is to find! 

(Martin in his colonel's cloak, Joan in her mail, 
David in his robe and crown — ^few there be that fail — 
Down the road to Paradise they stand to greet and 
hail!) 

Where the dark's a terror-thing, morn a hope doubt- 
tossed. 
Where the lads lie thinking long out in rain and frost. 
There they find their God again, long ago they lost! 

Where the night comes cruelly, where the hurt men 

moan, 
Where the crushed forgotten ones whisper prayers 

alone, 

Christ along the battle-fields comes to lead His own: 

189 



Souls that would have withered soon in the hot world's 

glare. 
Blown and gone like shrivelled things, dusty on the 

air. 
Rank on rank they follow Him, young and strong and 

fair! 

Ours is a sad Easter-tide, and a woeful day. 

But high up at Heaven's gate the saints are all 

gay. 
For the old road to Paradise, that's a crowded way! 

The Old Road to Paradise 

Margaret Widdemer 



The Dayspring from on high shall guide 
our feet in the way of peace. 

Far, far the mountain peak from me 
Where lone he stands, with look caressing; 
Yet from the valley, wistfully 
I lift my dreaming eyes, and see 
His hand stretched forth in blessing. 

Never bird sings nor blossom blows 
Upon that summit chill and breathless 

Where throned he waits amid the snows; 

But from his presence wide outflows 
Love that is warm and deathless! 

190 



O Symbol of the great release 
From war and strife! — unfailing fountain 
To which we turn for joy's increase, 
Fain would we climb to heights of Peace — 
Thy peace upon the mountain! 

The Christ of the Andes 

Florence Earle Coates 



Thy kingdom come! 

Across the bitter centuries I hear the wail of men: 
"Oh, would that Jesus Lord, the Christ, would come 

to us again.'* 
We decorate our altars with a ceremonious pride, 
With all the outward shows of pomp His worship is 

supplied : 
Great churches raise their mighty spires to pierce the 

sunlit skies 
While in the shadow of the cross we mutter blas- 
phemies. 

We know we do not do His will who lessoned us to pray, 
"Our Father grant within our lives Thy Kingdom rule 

to-day." 
The prayer He taught us once a week we mouth with 

half -shut eye 
While in the charnel-house of words immortal mean- 
ings die. 
Above our brothers' frailties we cry "Unclean ! Unclean !" 
And with the hands that served her shame still stone 

the Magdalene. 

191 



( We know within our factories that wan-cheeked women 
reel 

Among the deft and droning belts that spin from 
wheel to wheel. 

We know that unsexed childhood droops in dull-eyed 
drudgery — 

The little children that He blessed in far off Galilee, — 

Yet surely. Lord, our hearts would grow more merci- 
ful to them, 

If Thou couldst come again to us as once in Bethlehem. 

A Page from America's Psalter 

WiLLARD Wattles 



Suffer the little children, and forbid 
not, to come unto me. 



"Christ the Lord is risen!" 
Chant the Easter children. 
Their love-moulded faces 
Luminous with gladness, 
And their costly raiment 
Gleaming like the lilies. 

But last night I wandered 

Where Christ had not risen, 

WTiere love knows no gladness. 

Where the Lord of Hunger 

Leaves no room for lilies 

And no time for childhood. 
192 



And to-day I wonder 
Whether I am dreaming; 
For above the swelling 
Of their Easter music 
I can hear the murmur 
"Suffer all the children." 

Nay, the world is dreaming! 
And my seeing spirit 
Trembles for its waking, 
When their Saviour rises 
To restore the lilies 
To the outcast children. 

The Easter Children 

Elsa Barker 

/ came that they may have life, 
and may have it more abundantly. 

When the Lord of the great and the little. 

The potter whose hand shapes our clay, 
Sets a child in the midst of the market 

Where the world-peoples chaffer all day. 
Sets a child with its innocent questions. 

Its flower-face dimpled and fine. 
In the very heart's core of the clamor, 

A thought of the Maker divine; — 

And men, in their lust for dominion. 

Their madness for silver and gold. 

Crush the beauty and charm of that spirit. 

Make the flower-face withered and old, 
193 



Bind the hands and feet with a tether 
That childhood can never untie. 

Deem not that Jehovah unheeding 

Looks down from the heights of the sky. 



He sees, though we think Him unseeing, 

He knows when the factory wheels 
Grind down the life-blood of children; 

When the poor little bond-servant kneels 
In the pang of its frightful abasement; — 

Though all are deaf to its prayer. 
There is coming a dark day of judgment. 

And the Lord of the child will be there. 



The child in the midst, as we've marred it. 

Bent-shouldered, dull-eyed, and a slave, 
That cringes at word and at fetter. 

That cries for the rest of the grave; 
With our free flag unfolding above it. 

So free, from the pine to the palm! 
And our scared pallid children beneath it! 

There's a jar in the lilt of our psalm. 



From the mine where the midnight engulfs it. 

From the mill where the clogged air is thick 

With the dust of the weaving that chokes it; 

From the home where it's fevered and sick 
194 



With man's toil, when God meant it for gladness^ 

The child in the midst of our clay 
God-moulded, man-marred, calls to heaven 

For the vengeance we're daring this day. 

The Child in the Midst 

Margaret E. Sangster 



Whoso shall receive one such little child 
in my name, receiveth me. 

O Mary, lend thy Babe to me 
To hold upon my breast! 
It cannot be, it cannot be — 
Thy heart would shake his rest. 
Beneath thy robe I see it leap — 
How in such tumult could he sleep? 

God's Mother, shame upon thee now. 
So hard and cold to be! 
And who art thou — and who art thou 
That criest shame on me? 
A wasted woman, hungering sore 
For the sweet babe I never bore. 

Now for that waste be thine the shame — 
Thy sentence thou dost speak; 
And for that hunger thine the blame. 
Were no lost lambs to seek 
Where crowds unseeing pass and press- 
No little children motherless? 

195 



O Mary, let me seek for such! 

Mine eyes with tears were blind — 
Nay, daughter, seek not overmuch; 
Go forth and thou shalt find 
Naked and hungry everywhere 
The little ones thou didst not bear. 

Wipe clear of useless tears thine eyes. 
Thy heart of futile dreams. 
Go forth to face realities — 
One deed of mercy seems 
To this my Son and Me, more fair 
Than a whole Ufe of barren prayer. 

Love not in word, but in good sooth; 
Deserted and defiled. 
Each little human form in truth 
Harbours the Eternal Child. 
Held in thine arms. His eyes of grace 
Shall open to thy bending face. 

God's Mother, I have been to blame — 
Nay, daughter, — no regret. 
Forget thy blame, forget thy shame — 
Thy very self forget. 
Give wholly thine awakened heart. 
My Child hath need of all thou art. 

At Bethlehem 
Amelia Josephine Burr 

196 



Behold what manner of love the Father 
hath bestowed upon us, that we should 
be called children of God! 

Thou hast on earth a Trinity, — 
Thyself, my fellow-man, and me: 
When one with him, then one with Thee: 
Nor, save together, thine are we. 

To the Christ 

J. B. Tabb 

Can the blind 
guide the blind? 

She called from her cell, 
"Let me give you a rose," 
To the cold tract-man 
In his Sabbath clothes. 

And the tract-man said 
To the one gone mad, 
"How can you give 
What you never had?" 

"As you give Christ," 
The madwoman said, 
"While love in your heart 
Lies cold and dead." 

Madness 

Harry Lee 

197 



Ij any man cometh unto me, and kateth not 
- . . his own life, he cannot be my disciple. 

A Christmas gift, oh Lord — 
Some fiery vision. 

Not drowsy promises 
Of fields Elysian. 

It was but now we came 

Out of the jungle; 
And how can beasts contrive 

Save botch and bungle? 
Since half is still the beast 

And half is human. 
Sorrow must follow hard 

On man and woman. 

But let Thy kindness thrill 
Through hateful places: 

Our wicked streets are paved 
With baby faces — 

For these. Thy little ones. 
Strew Christmas graces; 

Let each one have a toy. 
Forget not any 

And think upon their tears — 
The sad too many! 

198 



For their sake come once more 

Down to Thy manger; 
Once more drive from Thy church 

The money-changer. 

Again where all may see 

Die for us, Master: 
Because we shrink too much 

From death's disaster. 
Master, once more die Thou, 

And show us how. 

On Christmas Day 
Georgia Wood Pangborn 



To-day if ye shall hear 
his voice — 

Once by an arch of ancient stone. 

Beneath . Italian olive-trees 
(In Pentecostal youth, too prone 

To visions such as these). 

And now a second time, to-day. 
Yonder, an hour ago! 'Tis strange. 

— ^The hot beach shelving to the bay. 
That far white mountain range. 

The motley town where Turk and Greek 
Spit scorn and hatred as I pass; 

Seraglio windows, doors that reek 
Sick perfume of the mass; 

199 



The muezzin cry from Allah's tower, 
French sailors singing in the street; 

The Western meets the Eastern power. 
And mingles — this is Crete. 



'Tis strange! No wonder and no dread 
Was on me; hardly even surprise. 

I knew before he raised his head 
Or fixed me with his eyes 

That it was he; far off I knew 

The leaning figure by the boat, 
The long straight gown of faded hue; 

The hair that round his throat 

Fell forward as he bent in speech 

Above the naked sailor there. 
Calking his vessel on the beach. 

Full in the noonday glare. 

Sharp rang the sailor's mallet-stroke 
Pounding the tow into the seam; 

He paused and mused, and would have spoke. 
Lifting great eyes of dream 

Unto those eyes which slowly turned — 

As once before, even so now — 
Till full on mine their passion burned 

With, "Yes, and is it thou.?" 

200 



Then o'er the face about to speak 
Again he leaned; the sunburnt hair. 

Fallen forward, hid the tawny cheek; 
And I who, for my share, 

Had but the instant's gaze, no more. 
And sweat and shuddering of the mind. 

Stumbling along the dazzling shore. 
Until a cool sweet wind 

From far-off Ida's silver caves 

Said, "Stay"; and here I sit the while. 

And all my being, for an hour. 

Has sat in stupor, without thought. 

Empty of memory, love, or power, 
A dumb wild creature caught 

In toils of purpose not its own! 

But now at last the ebbed will turns; 
Feeding on spirit, blood, and bone. 

The ghostly protest burns. 

"Yea, it is I, 'tis I indeed! 

But who art thou, and plannest what? 
Beyond all use, beyond all need! 

Importunate, unbesought, 

" Unwelcome, unendurable ! 

To the vague boy I was before — 

O unto him thou camest well; 

But now, a boy no more, 
201 



"Firm-seated in my proper good, 
Clear-operant in my functions due. 

Potent and plenteous of my mood, — 
What hast thou here to do? 

"Yes, I have loved thee — love thee, yes; 

But also — ^hear'st thou? — also him 
Who out of Ida's wilderness 

Over the bright sea-rim, 

"With shaken cones and mystic dance. 

To Dirce and her seven waters 
Led on the raving Corybants, 

And lured the Theban daughters 

"To play on the delirious hills 

Three summer days, three summer nights, 
Where wert thou when these had their wills? 

How liked thee their delights? 

"Past Melos, Pelos, to the straits, 
The waters roll their spangled mirth. 

And westward, through Gibraltar gates. 
To my own under-earth, 

"My glad, great land, which at the most 

Knows that its fathers knew thee; so 

Will spend for thee nor count the cost; 

But follow thee? Ah, no! 
202 



"Thine image gently fades from earth! 

Thy churches are as empty shells. 
Dim-plaining of thy words and worth. 

And of thy funerals! 

"But oh, upon what errand, then. 
Leanest thou at the sailor's ear? 

Hast thou yet more to say, that men 
Have heard not, and must hear?" 

Passages from Second Coming 

William Vaughn Moody 



Lot I am with you always, even 
unto the end of the world! 

Loud mockers in the roaring street 
Say Christ is crucified again: 

Twice pierced His gospel-bearing feet. 
Twice broken His great heart in vain. 

I hear and to myself I smile. 

For Christ talks with me all the while. 

No angel now to roll the stone 

From off His unawaking sleep. 

In vain shall Mary watch alone. 

In vain the soldiers vigil keep. 
203 



Yet while they deem my Lord is dead 
My eyes are on His shining head. 

Ah! never more shall Mary hear 
That voice exceeding sweet and low 

Within the garden calling clear: 

Her Lord is gone, and she must go. 

Yet all the while my Lord I meet 

In every London lane and street. s 

Poor Lazarus shall wait in vain. 

And Bartimeus still go bhnd; 
The healing hem shall ne'er again 

Be touched by suffering humankind. 

Yet all the while I see them rest. 
The poor and outcast, on His breast. 

No more unto the stubborn heart 
With gentle knocking shall He plead. 

No more the mystic pity start. 

For Christ twice dead is dead indeed. 

So in the street I hear men say. 
Yet Christ is with me all the day. 

The Second Crucifixion 

Richard Le Gallienue 



VIII 
CHRIST AND THE WORLD WAR 



He appointed singers . . . that should praise the Beauty of 
Holiness as they went out before the army. And when they 
began to sing and to praise, the Lord set ambushments 
against the enemy and they were smitten. 

Weary the centuries while His Kingdom waits, 
For earth is rent with strife and hate and woe, 
And Youth's bright armies down to death must go! 

Remorseless hell has opened wide its gates 

As if God's rule had passed to vengeful Fates 
And plotting fiends could wander to and fro ! 
Where now is Christ with tender love aglow — 

Christ who His days to mercy consecrates? 

"Ye call me Prince of Peace," He answers — "bless 
My name. But lo ! when man exults in crime, 

Mine is the lightning-stroke, the whirlwind-stress. 
The cannon's roar, the battle-front sublime ! 

My peace is the great Peace of Righteousness, 
And Love and Justice meet in Valor's prime!" 

/ Came Not to Send Peace but a Sword 

Edna Dean Proctor 



By what power or in what 
name have ye done this? 

The Kings of the earth are men of might, 
And cities are burned for their delight. 
And the skies rain death in the silent night, 
And the hills belch death all day! 

207 



But the Eang of Heaven, who made them all. 
Is fair and gentle, and very small; 
He lies in the straw, by the oxen's stall — 
Let them think of Him to-day! 

Kings. A Christmas Poem in War-tims 
Joyce Kilmer 

Killed in action, August 1. 1918 



Jems . . . Toade a scourge of small cords 

and drove the money-changers out of the Temple. 

Who said, "It is a booth where doves are soldf 

Who said, *'It is a money-changers* cavef 
Silence to such forever, and behold! 

It is a vast cathedral, and its nave 
And dim-lit transept and broad aisles are filled 

With a great nation's millions on their knees 
With new devotion and high fervor thrilled, 

Offering silver and heart's-ease 
And love and life and all sweet-temporal things. 

Still to keep bright 

The steady light 
That stifles in the wake of kings! 

A market-place! they cried? 

A lotus-land? They lied! 
It is a great cathedral, not with hands 
Upraised, but by the spirit's mute commands; 



Uplifted by tlie spirit, wall and spire, 

To house a nation's purified desire ! 

A church! Where in hushed fervor stand 

The children of contending races. 
Forgetting feud and fatherland— 

A hundred million lifted faces. 

From An Ode of Dedication 
Hermann Hagedorn 



Until the Ancient of Days come! 

In garments dyed with blood, thorn-crowned, alone, 
A wistful figure on the battle-field 
Is by frore moonlight through the dusk revealed. 
The mutterings of crass voices 'round him groan. 

"Hearing he has not heard; 

A god, he has not stirred 
To stay this shamefulness of war," men say. 
Spear-pierced by scorn he passes on his way. 

Dark is earth's skyline, scarlet-dark; and he 
Is pale as wind-blown ashes. His scarred face 
Droops to the slain boys in that slaughter-place; 
His wounded hands touch all hands tenderly. 

Yet when he lifts his eyes 

The love-light in them dies; 
For fury he has fury and for those 
Who show no mercy he no mercy knows. 

209 



He tramples out the wine-press of his wrath; 
He puts the mighty down from their high seat; 
Time-rotted tyrannies topple at his feet; 
Gaunt discrowned spectres flit before his path. 

Their doom was in his word 

When first Judea heard 
Of brotherhood. Kings scuttle at his nod, 
Blown down black battles by the breath of God. 

The night brims up with hate and misery; 
As from the ground, at each thin blart of fire, 
Gleam dead phosphoric eyes in deathless ire. 
The hosts snatch freedom from their butchery. 

Dead — no lords they fear. 

Dead — their blue lips jeer. 
Their cross, and his, drives on the smash of things. 
The Carpenter builds scaffolds for the Kings. 

The Carpenter 
James Church Alvord 



Not a sparrow shall fall 
without pour Father. 

Bird o'er the battlefield, singing in lull of the thunder. 
What gave you song? Oh, be migrant; be fleet- winged 

and pass ! 
Though year to year you have mated and brooded 

hereunder, 
Seek not your safety this spring in this blood-matted 

grass. 

210 



You that last Maytime sang unto the west and its 

glamor, 
Speed while you may, while your wings are unwounded 

and strong. 
Think you to nest in these trenches? This merciless 

clamor. 
Think you to drown its least shrapnel with lyrical song? 

Yet, if you stray, like an innocent child in a gutter. 
Wounded are here whose delirium shall hear you, and 

see 
Brooks in the farms of their youth, and whose fever 

shall mutter 
Name of a girl, of a mother, of Christ of the Tree. 

What, spite of shrapnel and danger, has made you 

enraptured? 
Seeing and hearing what man may not see and not hear? 
Bird o'er the battlefield, what has your tiny heart 

captured? 
Is it that Christ, walking storm-waves of trenches, 
comes near? 

Bird O'er the Battlefield 

Isabel Fiske Conant 



"Himself Be cannot save. 

One word sprang up in the heart of Christ, 

The center of all his power, 
The blossom of his transcendent life, — 

That miracle- word was **our." 
211 



Our Father ! 'Tis always " owr, " not " my, *' 

Together we must pray. 
Our Father ! DeUver us, lead us; 

Our debts, our bread to-day ! 

None can be Christ's and stand alone; 

'Tis only leagued that we run; 
There'll be no Christian upon this earth 

Till the last man is won. 

Together must we lift our hearts! 

This was his message high. 
Into the listening ear of God 

No man may whisper " I. " 

For self, He says, I may not fight. 

For my land, for my breath; 
But in the jeopardy of good, 

Then fight I to the death! 

A Thought of Jesus 

Maktha Foote Crow 



Migh above all principality and power 

mui might and dominion and every name that is named! 

There has been only one man in my mind 
All through the four black years. 
I've heard of him in the sodden tents. 

212 



I've seen his face in the filthy trench 
Where the soldiers laugh at fears: 
Yea, by the young men's biers 
I've seen him stand by the mothers 
Shivering under their tears. 

There has been only one man on the coasts 

Where the refugees are come; 

He has been in the minds of the massacred hosts 

Driven and starved and dumb; 

Where staggering lines of men obey 

The word that takes them a deathly way 

And souls fight on while ranks succumb. 

He has come very near — 

This one man of the world, 

Where the herded peoples die on the plain 

And the children dwindle like blighted grain; 

By fierce flags over high standards curled 

By embattled men in thousands hurled 

Out of the green and living world — 

He is writ on the Scroll of the Slain, 

And comes to his own again. 

Yea, to the man's shape in Berlin 

I see his passionless presence win; 

There, to the shamed, world-loathed head 

I see this one man enter in 

With calm accusing tread. 

So, while the world in trance 
Conceives an unborn Soul, 
I see this one man's countenance 
213 



Turned on the myriad eyes that glance 

Forward to his control. 

Through bloody towns and wreckstrewn seas. 

Along by the shattered orchard trees, 

I see New Being rise from its knees. 

New regiments enroll; 

Marshals a New Mankind 

And a world of this One Man's mind! 

The Type 
Edwina Stanton Babcock 



Inasmuch as He Himself hath suffered, being tempted. 
He is able to succor them that are tempted. 

These sodden slimy trenches are my pews; 
This is my flock — rude, blood-bespattered men. 
Some boys are here whom I once taught at home — 
Far closer are we now than in those days. 
Then I have other lads who say the church 
Breeds superstition and hypocrisy. 
Some swear and gamble — till I won their hearts 
I heard them curse me for a "Holy Joe"! 

Yet with what awe I minister to them — 
As fine a breed as God has put on earth! 
Irreverent — true ! But by their scoffs they mask 
The altar fires aflame within their breasts ! 
I do not preach to them that bloodless Christ 
Whom artists picture haunting No Man's Land — 

214 



Aloof and shuddering at the things He sees. 
Instead I tell them of that Man who met 
With fearless heart yon despot's cross and sword, 
And died, that through His death the soul might live. 

They nod their heads; they understand this Christ . . 
They take Him with them to their Calvary! 

The Army Chaplain 
Daniel Henderson 



/ 'pray not that Thou shouldst take them out of the vxyrld 
hut that Thou shouldst keep them from the evil. 

I cannot think or reason, 
I only know He came 
With hands and feet of healing 
And wild heart all aflame. 

With eyes that dimmed and softened 
At all the things He saw, 
And in his pillared singing 
I read the marching Law. 

I only know He loves me. 
Enfolds and understands — 
And oh, his heart that holds me. 
And oh, his certain hands — 
215 



The man, the Christ, the soldier. 
Who from his cross of pain 
Cried to the dying comrade, 
"Lad, we shall meet again." 



Comrades of the Cross 

WiLLARD Wattles 



Whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord, 

My shoulders ache beneath my pack, 
(Lie easier. Cross, upon His back.) 

I march with feet that burn and smart, 
(Tread, Holy Feet, upon my heart.) 

Men shout at me who may not speak, 

(They scourged Thy back and smote Thy cheek.) 

I may not lift a hand to clear 
My eyes of salty drops that sear, 

(Then shall my fickle soul forget 
Thine Agony of Bloody Sweat?) 

My rifle hand is stiff and numb, 

(From Thy pierced palm red rivers come.) 

Lord, Thou didst suflFer more for me 
Than all the hosts of land and sea, 
216 



So let me render back again 

This millionth of Thy gift. Amen. 



Prayer of a Soldier in France 
Joyce Kilmer 

Killed in action, August 1, 1918 



Accept your share of hardship, 
like a noble soldier of Christ Jestis. 

I came to a halt at the bend of the road; 

I took off my knapsack and lightened my load; 
I came to a halt at the bend of the road. 

And I said to my Lord, "You have left me alone; 
And the road is so long — see — I'm tired to the 
bone—" 
I said to my Lord, "You have left me alone.'* 

"My son," Jesus said, "are you glad what you do? 

All that I suffered, you're suffering, too. 
My son," Jesus said, "are you glad what you do?" 

'Twas for love of you, dear, that I died on the tree; 
My child, can you die for your country — and me? 
Twas for love of you, dear, that I died on the tree. 

I said to my Lord, " Jesus, take my whole soul, " 

Then I took up the march and I shouldered my roll; 
I said to my Lord, "Jesus, take my whole soul." 

217 



I'm ready. Dear Jesus, be happy and smile. 

Rest a little. I'll carry your burden a while. 
I'm ready. Dear Jesus, be happy — and smile! 

At the Bend of the Road 

Translation by May Lamberton Becker, from the 

French of Charles Mercier, Stretcher-bearer, VI 

Company Machine-gunners. 



Ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: 
see thai ye he not troubled. 

Wild Europe, red with Wodin's dreadful dew. 
On fire with Loki's hate, more savage than 
Beasts that we shame by hkening to man. 
Was it toward this the toiling centuries grew? 

Was it for this the Reign of Love began 
In that young heretic, that gracious Jew, 
Whose race his followers flout the ages through? 
Is Time at last a mere comedian. 

Mocking in cap and bells our pompous boast 
Of progress? Nay, we will not bear it so. 
A million hands launch ships to succor woe; 
The stars that shudder o'er the slaughtering host 

Rain blessing on the Red Cross groups that go 
Careless of shrapnel, emulous for the post 
Where foul diseases wreak their uttermost 
Of horror. Saintship walks incognito 

218 



As scoffing Science, but Christ knows his own. 
Sway as it may the war-god's fell caprice. 
The victories of Love shall still increase 
Until at last, from all this wail and moan. 

Rises the song of brotherhood to cease 
No more, no more, — the song that shall atone 
Even for this mad agony. The throne 
That war is building is the throne of Peace. 

Wild Europe* 
Katharine Lee Bates 

* Taken by permission from "The Retinue and Other Poems," copyright E. P. 
Dutton and Co. 



Mahomed's banners dark the sun. 
Under the smile of the Christian Hun, 
Islam hate hath its work begun. 
March, march, Armenia, march! 

Over your threshold seeps a flood; 
Bright are your lintels flecked with blood: 
March, march, Armenia, march! 
Out at the doors where your first-born males 
Dripping sag from the piercing nails, 
Sound your reveille with dying wails — 
March, march, Armenia, march! 
Lingering woe of the crucified. 
Hanging on high like Christ who died: 
Time not to weep by your crucified — 
March, marchy Armenia, marchl 
219 



You flaunt no helmets to the skies, 
Dulling the red rain from your eyes — 
March, march, Armenia, march! 
Blinded, grope to the desert wild. 
Trampling the head of the slaughtered child; 
Over the limbs of the maid defiled, 
March, march, Armenia, march! 

Climbing Arahrat's sacred crest 

Where came the Ark of Life to rest, 

March, march, Armenia, march! 

Sounds the last charge: the trumpets blow; 

Waves of steel through your thin ranks flow; 

Four thousand feet to the crags below, 

March, march, Armenia, march! 

Chrisfs arms outstretched no hate can hide — 
When Rome slew him, it nailed them wide! 
Into the heart of the Crucified, 
March, march, Armenia, march! 

Armenian Marching Song 
Ajan Syrian. 



Ye are come to Mount Zion, the City of the Ever-living 
God, to the spirits of just men made perfect. 

A banner blows where Sharon's rose in beauty once did 
bloom, 

The cruel Crescent meets its doom, the Cross trium- 
phant goes! 

220 



Where once the harp and tabor rung a newer song is 

sung — 
L We're going to Jerusalem to vanquish Freedom's foes." 
"We're going to Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jerusalem; 
We're going to Jerusalem to fight for Freedom's 

cause, 
That prophecy may be fulfilled, of lands untilled 

and thousands killed. 
And mighty sacrifice be spilled, obedient to laws." 

Oh little town of Bethlehem, thy streets may sound 

again 
With rhythmic beat of marching feet of world-wide 

gathered men. 
They follow true. Gentile and Jew, the great Judean's 

word. 
Who said, "I do not bring to you Peace, but I bring a 

sword." 

Throughout each blue Judean hill stalk martial figures 

strange. 
And mighty guns that seek their range make Hebron's 

echoes thrill. 
From ancient temple, mosque, and shrine, cathedral, 

chapel, home, 
Come men who knelt in England or bowed the knee 

at Rome, 
Or bent the brow at Buddhist shrine, or failed of any 

creed; 
All claim the right to march and fight for Freedom at 

her need. 
They're going to Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, 

221 



They're going to Jerusalem with cannon and with 

sword; 
From land of palm and land of pine, from tropic 

shrine and Afric mine, 
They're going to Jerusalem to battle for the Lord. 

And when the warrior's task is done, at set of sun, at 

rest of gun. 
Perhaps some Shropshire lad may run, forgetful of the 

war, 
To rest his limbs and drink his fill by cool Siloam's 

shady rill 
Or sleep upon some sheltered hill that sacred feet once 

bore. 
Some hardy boy from Saskatoon beneath the moon may 

rest and croon 
Some modern ukulele tune where David piped of yore. 
And men from Dublin and Dundee dream deep beneath 

some olive tree, 
Or row on peaceful Galilee or wander on its shore. 

For ours shall be Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jerusalem; 
For ours shall be Jerusalem, that golden city blest, 
The happy home of which we've sung in every land 

and every tongue 
When there the pure white cross is hung, great 

spirits shall have rest! 

The Last Crusade 

Published ten days before the taking of Jerusalem. 

Anne Higginson Spiceb 

222 



This charge I commit unto thee: wage 

a good warfare, holding faith and a good conscience. 

What can be worth this cost of gold and tears, 

These lands laid desolate with fire and blood. 

This ruin past the mending of our years. 

These generations blighted in the bud? 

To seek until we find reality; 

To know ourselves, our brothers, and our Lord; 

In our own hearts to feel the searching sword 

That kills the false however dear it be. 

O God! give us to know 

The holy heart of suffering, and kneel 

To give Thee solemn thanks that we can feel 

A little of the pain that these have borne 

Who for Thy sake the crown of thorns have worn! 

We dare not say — "Be ours as Belgium's heart; 

Ours as the heart of France!" We only pray 

Help us to do our part; 

And to the children of a brighter day 

Give an enduring peace that shall not stray 

From Thy dear law of Love, whate'er befall — 

God, that were worth it all. 

That Were Worth It All 
Amelia Josephine Burr^ 



INDEX OF POEMS 



Anger of Christ, The, 93. 

Annunciation, The, 3. 

An Unbeliever, 179. 

Apology of Demetrius, The, 148. 

Armenian Marching Song, 219. 

Army Chaplain, The, 214. 

Ascension, The, 134. 

At Bethlehem, 195. 

At Gethsemane, 105. 

At Jerusalem, 40. 

At Jerusalem, 99. 

At Nazareth, 40. 

At the Bend of the Road, 217. 

At the Manger's Side, 21. 

Baldur in Niflheim, 159. 
Ballad of the Comforting, The, 

117. 
BaUad of the Cross, The, 26. 
Ballad of the Goodly Fere, 140. 
Ballad of the Wise Men, A, 19. 
Ballad of Trees and the Master, 

A, 104. 
Ballad of Wise Men, A, 22. 
Bird O'er the Battlefield, 210. 
Blessed Road, The, 121. 
Bronze Christ, The, 156. 
By the Sea of Galilee, 63. 

Calvary, 109. 
Carpenter, The, 209. 
Carpenter's Son, The, 56. 
Cedars of Lebanon, The, 9. 
Child, 41. 

Child in the Midst, The, 193. 
Childless, The, 31. 
Child's Christmas Song, A, 178. 
Christ-child, The, 37. 
Christmas Folk-Song, A, 10. 
Christmas Pilgrimage, The, 169. 
Christ of Raphael's Transfigura- 
tion, The, 76. 
Christ of the Andes, The, 190. 
Christ Scourged, 108. 



Citizen of the World, 75. 

Come unto Me, 78. 
Comrade Jesus, 113. 
Comrades of the Cross, 215. 
Consolator, 82. 
Cost of Saving, The, 79. 
Country Carol, A, 66. 

Dream of Claudia Procula, The, 
105. 

Easter, 133. 
Easter at Nazareth, 43. 
Easter Children, The, 192. 
Empty Cross, The. 118. 

Fisherman Speaks, A, 139. 
Fishers, The, 83. 
Flight into Egypt, The, 35. 
From Bethlehem to Calvary, 110. 
From Nazareth, 68. 

Garden of the Sepulchre, The, 

127. 
Gates and Doors, 5. 
Gennesar, 64. 
Good Friday, 111. 
Good Friday Night, 99. 
Gospel of Mark, The, 143. 
Guard of the Sepulchre, A, 129. 

His Birthday, 17. 
His Laureate, 161. 
How He Came, 85. 

I Came Not to Send Peace but 

a Sword, 207. 
In His Steps, 66. 
In Palestine, 63. 
In the Carpenter's Shop, 55. 

Jericho, 86. 

Jewish Conscript, The, 183. 
Jew to Jesus, The, 162. 
John, 102. 



224 



Joseph and Mary, 12. 

Joses, the Brother of Jesus, 48. 

Judge Me, O Lord, 174. 

Kings, 207. 

Kings of the East, The, 16. 

Lament, The, 98. 

Lark, The, 120. 

Last Crusade, The, 220. 

Lazarus, 88. 

Lily, The, 80. 

Little Town, The, 4. 

Lost Word of Jesus, A, 77. 

Madness, 197. 

Madonna of the Carpenter-Shop, 

The, 30. 
Magdalen to Christ, 87. 
Magi and the Faery Folk, The, 24. 
Martha, 129. 
Mary at Nazareth, 45. 
Mary Magdalen, 131. 
Mary's Quest, 38. 
Missionaries, The, 167. 
Mother and Son, 47. 
Motherhood, 115. 
Mother, Mary, 25. 
Mother, The, 116. 
Mount of Beatitudes, The, 69. 
Murillo's "Holy Family of the 

Little Bird," 44. 
Mused Mary in Old Age, 153. 
My Father and I, 181. 
My Father's Business, 42. 
My Master, 107. 

Nativity Song, 7, 28. 
Nativity, The, 36. 
Nazareth, 36. 
Nazareth Shop, The, 49. 
Nazareth Town, 53. 
Nicodemus, 73. 
Nmth Hour, The, 111. 



On Syrian Hills, 181. 
Out of Egypt Have I Called My 
Son, 35. 

Page from America's Psalter, A, 

191. 
Palm Sunday, 96. 
Palm Sunday in Galilee, 81. 
Passing of Christ, The, 175. 
'Pharisee, The, 70. 
Playmate, The, 39. 
Prayer of a Soldier in France, 

216. 
Prodigal Son, The, 71. 

Rabboni, 131. 
Recompense, The, 132. 

Second Coming, 199. 

Second Crucifixion, The, 203. 

Sepulchre in the Garden, The, 132. 

Shadow, The, 52. 

Shepherds, The, 13. 

Song of a Heathen, The, 139. 

Star of Bethlehem, The, 15. 

Tears of Mary, The, 29. 
That Were Worth It All, 222. 
Thief on the Cross, The, 112. 
Thought of Jesus, A, 211. 
Told in the Market-place, 94. 
To Jesus, 163. 
To See the New Baby, 11. 
To the Christ, 197. 
Twain of Her, The, 74. 
Type, The, 212. 

Via Crucis, 122. 

Vigil of Joseph, The, 32. 

Voice of Christmas, The, 172. 



Ode of Dedication, 208. 
Old Road to Paradise, The, 
On Christmas Day, 198. 
On Christmas Eve, 173. 



Was Subject Unto Them, 51. 
When Christ Was Born, 8. 
White Comrade, The, 184. 
White Comrade, The, 187. 
Wild Europe, 218. 
189. Wilderness, The, 65. 

Woman of Samaria, A, 86. 
Wooden Christ, The, 183. 
225 ir^ 



INDEX OF AUTHORS 



Alvord, James Church, 209. 

Babcock, Edwina Stanton, 94, 

212. 
Baird,' George M.P., 22, 153. 
Barker, Elsa, 32, 192. 
Bates, Carroll Lund, 96. 
Bates, Katharine Lee, 15, 16, 40, 

44, 63, 66, 78, 81, 99, 105, 173, 

218. 
Beall, Dorothy Landers, 70. 
Becker, May Lamberton, 217. 
Binns, Henry Bryan, 163. 
Brainerd, Mary Bowen, 76. 
Branch, Anna Hempstead, 88, 

179. 
Burr, Amelia Josephine, 31, 87, 

159, 187, 195,222. 
Burt, Maxwell Struthers, 122. 
Burton, Richard, 80, 131, 181. 

Carter, Elizabeth, 52. 
Clark, Charles Badger, Jr., 181. 
Cleghom, Sarah N., 113, 174. 
Coates, Florence Earle, 8, 25, 120, 

190. 
Conant, Isabel Fiske, 210. 
Crew, Helen Coale, 9. 
Crow, Martha Foote, 183. 211. 

Daly, T. A., 178. 
Dawson, W. J., 47, 85. 
Day, Sarah J., 42, 51. 
Duer, Douglas, 86. 

Erskine, Barbara Peattie, 131. 

Finley, John, 132. 

Frank, Florence Kiper. 162, 183. 



Gilder, Richard Watson, 63, 93, 

139, 175. 
Going, Charles Buxton, 121. 
Guild, Marian Pelton, 71. 
Guiney, Louise Imogen, 7, 28. 
Gunsaulus, Frank W., 79. 

Hagedorn, Hermann, 208. 
Harding, Ruth Guthrie, 30. 
Hazard, Caroline, 35, 36, 65, 69, 

86, 98, 111, 129, 133. 
Henderson, Daniel, 214. 

Iris, Scharmel, 38, 139. ' 

Jewett, Sophie, 13. 

Kemp, Harry, 39, 48, 73, 172. 
Kihner, Joyce, 5, 75, 161, 207, 
216. 

Lanier, Sidney, 104. 
Lee, Agnes, 37, 115. 
Lee, Harry, 107, 197. 
Le Gallienne, Richard, 203. 
Lillie, Maria Elmendorf, 82. 

Mclntyre, Robert, 49, 167. 
Markham, Edwin, 127, 129, 134. 
Masters, Edgar Lee, 143, 148. 
Monroe, Harriet, 112. 
Moody, William Vaughn, 99. 199. 

Nicholson, Meredith, 110. 

Pangborn, Georgia Wood, 198. 
Peabody, Josephine Preston, 83. 
Pettus, Martha Elvira, 105. 
Pound, Ezra, 140. 
Proctor. Edna Dean, 40, 207. 



Garrison. Theodosia. 3, 26, 29, Reese, Lizette Woodworth, 10, 
117. 111. 

226 



^■a^ 



^^ 



Rice, Cale Young, 45, 118. 
Robinson, Edwin Arlington, 109. 

Sandburg, Carl, 41. 
Sangster, Margaret E., 68, 193. 
SchaufBer, Robert Haven, 184. 
ScoUard, Clinton, 4, 43, 53, 64, 

156, 169. 
Smith, May Riley, 17. 
Spicer, Anne Higginson, 220. 
Stott, Roscoe Gilman, 12. 
Syrian, Ajan, 219. 



Tabb, J. B., 132, 197. 
Teasdale, Sara, 55, 56. 
Thomas, Edith M., 11, 24. 

Van Dyke, Henry. 35. 36, 77. 

Walsh, Thomas, 21. 

Ward, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, 

74. 
Wattles, Willard, 102, 191, 215. 
Wheelock, John HaU, 116. 
Widdemer, Margaret, 19, 66, 189 
Woodberry, George Edward, 108 



227 



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